"Oh, Mum, of course I want to get home soon, but this is a rare opportunity… Yes, Draco is with me, but that is not the point… Please, do not say that… Mum, he is not mine—Mum? Are you still listening to me?" Hermione's voice came through the open door from the other end of the sitting room, and seemed to grow lower and lower.
In Draco's suite at the Wizarding Hot Springs Sanatorium, a long telephone line stretched from the study to the sofa in the centre of the sitting room. Hermione held the receiver at one end of the line—she was trying to reassure her worried parents.
Without a doubt, any parent of a thirteen-year-old girl would inevitably worry about their daughter possibly staying out all night, no matter how justified the reason.
"Oh, Dad, thank God! You finally got the phone. It is like this, because the potion is special, it cannot be exposed to light, so it can only be brewed at night. It is not that I intentionally wanted to come home late…" Hermione's tone softened as she explained into the receiver.
Draco was in his study replying to those long and tedious letters.
It was nothing more than Blaise going to a party with his mother and discovering some gossip about a classmate at school; and Pansy getting into a fight with some wizard's daughter and scratching her face.
Crabbe and Goyle, one boasting about how many extra bowls of rice he ate today, and the other pitifully asking if he could take a look at his homework.
And then there was Theodore, who successfully brewed a Hiccoughing Solution over the summer, a feat far beyond what a soon-to-be third-year student should be capable of. This deserved a few words of praise from Draco—given that he eagerly wrote a letter to boast about it—it was rare for this introverted boy to have moments of loneliness where he felt "happy but no one to share it with."
"Mum, please give the phone to Dad… Please, do not assume I am like that… No, this really has nothing to do with him… He is nobody to me… Why should I let him on the phone? Does this medicine really need to be brewed at night? Am I the kind of girl who lies?" Hermione said angrily.
Draco would occasionally pause, pausing at the tip of his eagle-feather quill to listen to the sounds coming from the sitting room—from which Hermione's voice was gradually rising—and chuckle to himself.
It seems she has recovered her energy.
Hermione was not lying. All Potion Masters knew that Felix Felicis should be brewed away from sunlight, making it best prepared at night. This was precisely why Slughorn—the cautious Potions Master—required them to come to him at night to learn how to brew Felix Felicis.
However, Hermione did not want to go home today, not only because of her potion-making lessons, but also because she did not want her parents to worry.
She had been crying in the garden for too long and her eyes were swollen. She was now applying the ointment Draco had given her, trying to reduce the swelling as soon as possible.
Draco was losing interest in continuing the fight. After hastily replying to a few letters, he could not resist leaving his study to see if the sulking girl needed any help.
Hermione was sitting on the sofa, wearing what looked like a pair of comical spectacles, with a ring of sticky yellow ointment on her left eyelid. The ointment did not smell pleasant; it was somewhat like the smell of petrol in the Muggle world.
She was absentmindedly holding the phone to her ear, listening to something, seemingly at a loss as to what to do with her overly lively mother; at the same time, she was applying cosmetics to her right eye in front of a hand mirror.
Seeing him come out, she wrinkled her nose and, in desperation, mouthed to Draco, "Help me..."
Draco suppressed a laugh, pretending to ignore her silly look with the ointment on her face. He sat down beside her with an air of superiority, took the receiver from between her shoulder and ear, and said calmly to Mrs Granger on the other end, "Monica, it is me... Yes, that is right... You can rest assured, I have already booked a room for her nearby. She can move in any time after the potion is made... If we finish early, I would be happy to take her home... Of course, it is my duty... Do not mention it... It is no trouble at all... All right, no problem, I shall take good care of her..."
Finally, he put down the receiver and gently tapped the back of it with his finger. As if it had a mind of its own, the receiver "whooshed" back to the base of the old-fashioned telephone in the inner room.
"All right," he said in a matter-of-fact tone, as if he had done something extremely simple. "She agreed quite readily. Not as difficult as you made it seem."
"That is because she was fooled by your looks!" Hermione said, pursing her lips. "Mum is a bit superficial; she has always had a very good impression of you…"
Draco was in a good mood. Her words seemed to subtly imply approval of his appearance. Casually picking up a green apple from the fruit tray on the coffee table, he twirled it in his hand and looked at Hermione: "Want one?"
"No need," she said listlessly, still examining her dark circles.
Then, her stomach rumbled, spoiling the mood. She blushed, picked up a mirror, and completely hid her face behind it.
Draco chuckled. He grabbed a Baroque-style sterling silver handbell from the coffee table and shook it a few times. Accompanied by the melodious ringing of the bell, a yellowed parchment suddenly darted in through the crack in the door, floating lightly in front of them.
"Mr Granger treated me to a meal yesterday, so of course I cannot let his daughter go hungry. Do not be shy, order something to eat, just to keep me company—I am starving." He said casually, then took a bite of the green apple in his hand, the sweet and sour juice instantly filling his mouth.
His hunger was temporarily relieved. With a satisfied sigh, he gestured for Hermione to look at the parchment.
It was a menu, with the names of food and drinks flashing across it. He had not forgotten his evening study session with Slughorn. It was no easy task; no one could endure it without eating something beforehand.
Hermione glanced at him, seeing how much he enjoyed eating the apple, and was convinced by his performance. She looked at the menu hanging in the air with interest, studied it for a moment, then hesitated and turned to look at him again. "What should I order?"
"Oh, you just need to tell the menu what you want to eat…" Draco said casually. The manila menu swayed in mid-air, as if agreeing with him.
"Well then—French onion soup, Brussels sprouts, cherry jam tart…" she said cautiously to the menu.
The menu swayed in the air a few times, and the names of the dishes Hermione had ordered gradually appeared on the blank space on the back.
"What would you like to drink?" Draco asked.
"Anything is fine," Hermione said casually, looking curiously at the words appearing on the back of the menu.
Since that was the case, Draco calmly ordered her a large pitcher of chilled watermelon juice—given that the little girl said she liked the smell of watermelon.
Speaking of which, why would Hermione like watermelon flavour? Does she even like that fruit? I reckoned her favourite was strawberries. Puzzled, he casually ordered himself roasted lamb chops, Yorkshire pudding, and a pot of Keemun black tea.
The menu quickly jotted down his words. After Hermione lost interest in the menu, Draco rang the bell again, and the parchment shook and flew swiftly out from under the door.
Hermione picked up the hand mirror again, wanting to examine her eyelids.
"By the way, where did you get this ointment?" she asked curiously. "I have never heard of it before."
"Oh, it is an ointment obtained through special channels," Draco reassured her. "It has already been tested and works well, so you can rest assured."
The anti-swelling ointment was sent to Draco by the Weasley brothers; it was for treating bruises from the Telescope Incident, and unexpectedly, it came in handy here. Draco had a lot of confidence in their product—it could even work instantly on bruises, so reducing swelling would be a piece of cake.
"Do you reckon the swelling will go down before nine o'clock?" she asked worriedly, turning her head slightly to ask, "Look, is it better now?"
When she was learning to brew Felix Felicis at night, she did not want to leave a bad impression on a Potions Master like Mr Slughorn.
"Come a little closer," Draco said softly.
At this moment, the sky outside the window was pitch black, and a flickering yellow candlelight suddenly shone from the wall lamp in the room. Hermione moved closer to him; Draco stretched out a few fingers, held her chin, and brought her face directly towards him, making her look closer.
She let him manipulate her face, unaware that anything was amiss.
The dim candlelight flickered, bringing her a drowsy feeling. She stared blankly at his face, her mind somewhat sluggish, only fragmented thoughts vaguely surfacing within her:
His hands are warm. His face is very close to mine, so close that I can see his deep double eyelids and thick eyelashes.
His eyebrows seem a little darker than before. His eyes appear somewhat deep in the dim light, and he is staring intently into mine.
His face seems to have matured; it is no longer the chubby face of a first-year. He has lost his already limited baby fat, leaving only a pointed chin and well-defined cheeks.
But his lips are still so thin. They are pressed tightly together, shaped like gentle waves, and extremely rosy in colour.
All these details were too clear, too captivating. Hermione awkwardly looked away. Her gaze moved upward, sweeping past his straight nose, and focusing on his hair.
He seemed to have not used hair wax to style his hair into a slicked-back look for a long time. Instead, he let his hair down casually, the platinum-blond ends smoothly covering part of his eyebrows and ears, making him look gentle and lazy.
This reminded Hermione of a certain feline, the kind that makes you want to pet its fur.
Forgetting her earlier nervousness, she could not help but smile and say, "I like your hairstyle now."
His dark eyebrows lifted slightly, and his eyes filled with a bright smile. For some reason, she knew this was a sign that he was in a good mood.
"Are you praising me?" he asked cheerfully. After studying her carefully for a while, he finally lowered his hand that was supporting her face and told her with satisfaction, "Do not worry. The medicine has been completely absorbed, and the redness and swelling are no longer visible."
"That is brilliant. Thank you!" she said happily, then held up the mirror to try and wipe off the sticky residue of ointment.