Keeping with the Company

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Keeping With the Company

by coven

Rated PG-13

Hermione offers her best friend Harry a place to stay after a girl discards him. Harry accepts, knowing that the arrangement is indefinite until he finds a suitable place for himself. But things take a strange turn when they both find out that keeping each other company is turning out to be a permanent thing after all.

Disclaimer: This is a Harry Potter fan fiction. Standard disclaimers apply.

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WARNING: More Draco here!

NOTES:

1. Backgrounder on Draco and Hermione's relationship will be in later chapters.

2. Artie will also make more appearances.

3. Bianca will appear in a later chapter.

4. Harry and Hermione will stop being clueless soon. Clueless Harry/Hermione this long is OOC, even for me.

OTHERS: By the way, I work full time during the day and I also have graduate studies at night, plus some volunteer work on the side. This is the last chapter I will be posting with almost daily intervals. After this, it's back to one (or two if I'm lucky) chapter a week. But thanks for all your reviews! They keep me going :)

Chapter 4: Hurricane Harry

Mr. and Mrs. Malfoy… Mr. and Mrs. Malfoy… Malfoy… Malfoy… Malfoy

The words swam inside Harry's head. He felt as if a sledgehammer had been shoved into his gut. He gripped hard at the arm of the chair next to him, and looked from Draco to Hermione and back again. He stared at the rings in question. Was this really happening? He felt as if he was in one of those hidden camera shows. Yes, it was probably one of those.

“Hermione,” Harry was vexed to find that his voice had suddenly become hoarse. “Is this true?”

“Uhmm,” Hermione immediately pulled away from Draco's hold and stepped forward tentatively. “Well, sort of.”

“What kind of answer is that, `Sort of?” Harry roared.

Hermione winced.

“Harry, you're overreacting,” she said as soothingly as possible.

“What do you mean overreacting?” Harry stepped closer menacingly. To say that he was stymied was an understatement. He felt betrayed, and the last time he felt that way was during the days of the Order -when he found out that Dumbledore was keeping vital information from him. He learned to forgive eventually but he never got over it. He hated the pain and he felt it rousing in him again, but this time it was different, a lot different.

“Tell me Hermione,” he spat out menacingly. “How do you think should I react to the fact that my best friend ran off and got married to a scum…?”

“Hey,” somebody, who in the more cogent recesses of Harry's muddled mind sounded much like Draco, exclaimed.

“…without even mentioning it to me?” Harry continued on, ignoring the interruption.

“Uhm, Harry,” Hermione said gently.

“And to think you were fuming last night about me not spending quality time with you for six months,” Harry became more chagrined as he observed how calmly Hermione was taking it. “I knew those letters on occasion weren't enough but I don't think I deserve this… this abomination!”

“Harry…”

“And oh!” he yelled, throwing his hands to the air. His vein at this temple was throbbing wildly. “That is why you were asking me just a while ago what I thought of the idea of you and HIM together. I know you're intelligent Hermione, but that was plain sneaky. Very sneaky of you…”

Hermione now understood what Harry felt last night. She silently cursed Merlin at the way the circumstances were making fun of her. She shook her head, studying Harry as he started pacing the room, not anymore talking to her but just plain raging in general. She pursed her lips and directed a baleful look at Draco who just shrugged his shoulders. Why wasn't he getting any screaming from Harry, or better yet a punch in his smug face? Why was she getting all the damage?

“And you got married to… of all people why…”

This had got to stop.

“Harry!” she screamed at the completely insensible-at-the-moment bloke. “Are you done?”

“Wha-hat?” Harry shook his head as her scream finally got through him.

“I said are you done? Are you finished?” Hermione repeated a little breathlessly.

Silence followed as two people stared at each other while another stood at the sideline watching them amusedly as if enjoying a play. And it looked exactly like that. Hermione's living room was serving as a stage to a very peculiar string of events.

And then there was the sound of the beginnings of laughter. Hermione couldn't contain herself any longer and went ahead and decided to lose herself in the absurdity of the moment. It was insane, a complete madhouse! She laughed until tears were streaming down her cheeks. Harry and Draco were only able to stare at her in befuddlement.

“Harry… Oh my gosh,” she haltingly said after a while. “I'm so sorry! I'm so sorry… I can't… I can't…”

She stepped forward and threw her arms around the poor guy and laughed again. She felt him stiffen but she didn't care. She stood on her toes and kissed him on the cheek.

“Oh Harry, you buffoon! I so adore you!” she said softly before having another fit of giggles. She wiped the tears away and while still laughing said to the bystander, “ Draco, can you please… I have to go… air… need air…”

Harry followed her with his eyes as she flew off, chortling like crazy. Turning to Malfoy, he said threateningly, “What the bloody hell is going on here? And wipe that smirk off your face Malfoy!”

Draco held his palms in front of him.

“Hey, easy Potter!” he said mock-scared. “You'll mess the Armani.”

“I don't bloody care,” Harry said with clenched teeth, his hand forming into a fist. He wasn't that daft not to know there was something else here. For the second time that morning, he was at the receiving end of life's very cruel jokes. “Explain it to me now, or the last thing you'll need to worry about are your bloody clothes!”

Draco shrugged, not really threatened by a fuming Harry Potter. He may have defeated Valdemort, but that doesn't mean he's insusceptible to pranks. And this one was a good example of that. Draco suppressed the desire to rub his hands together in glee.

“First of all,” he explicated nonchalantly. “I resent the fact that you called me `scum.' Second, Hermione and I aren't really married. The rings that you saw are really our wands charmed to look like rings. We are working undercover as a muggle couple, and we needed props that could also serve as arsenal. And third, it's not really Mr. and Mrs. Malfoy, it's Mr. and Mrs. Smith.”

Harry felt numb. It was just a prank, a stupid Slytherin-trademarked prank!

“Malfoy,” Harry started, finally finding his voice. “Count yourself lucky that-”

“Oh, I'm so sorry Harry,” Hermione gushed in, unknowingly, but fortunately, interrupting a hex. She looked much composed now, but the playful twinkle in her eyes was still there. She walked towards the two men. “What got into you, Draco?”

“Sorry,” Malfoy sniggered. “The look on Potter's face… so priceless!”

“Draco!” Hermione cried exasperatedly, though Harry thought in disgust that Hermione's reprimand needed a little more heat.

“Alright, alright,” Draco rolled his eyes but became rather serious as he faced Harry. He wouldn't apologize for something so brilliant so he said something that would suffice, “That was crude of me Potter.”

“Give me a minute,” Harry was too emotionally drained to say anything else.

Hermione sighed and got one of Harry's hands and held it in her own. She cringed as she noted that it felt cold to her touch. Draco's jokes were often a tad too mean, and this was no exception.

“We're on assignment,” she explained. “Basically undercover work as a muggle couple. There is word that a former death eater is posing as a muggle doctor and is prescribing unlicensed potion for infertility to childless couples. It's usually the plebe aurors who get work of this kind, but they are already all on minor assignment so Moody gave the case to us. We still don't have an idea on to what the effect of the potion is. But the fact that the wizard used to be a death eater is still worth checking.”

“And to think that they are not in the liberty to say anything,” Harry muttered, glaring at Draco who blatantly ignored it.

“Hmm?”

“Nothing,” Harry tiredly replied. With his free hand he pushed his glasses up his head and rubbed at the spot between his eyes. He was genuinely feeling the stirrings of a headache.

“Harry?”

He heaved a sigh, and placed his glasses back on.

“Hmm?”

Hermione was still holding his hand. He looked at their entwined fingers and then at her solemn face. How could he deny her anything when all she needed to do was to look at him like that?

“Are you angry?”

“Am I angry?” Harry asked. “Of course it would please me greatly, if Draco does not dare show his face, say for a quarter of a century?”

“But you'll miss me,” Draco joked.

“Watch it,” the other man warned.

“I'm really sorry about this,” Hermione repeated. “But I'll make it up to you, I promise! Please?”

Harry surrendered to the look. He noted that Hermione was doing a good imitation of his Puppy-Dog Act. The thought made him smile tentatively, which was a big mistake for Hermione soon flashed him one of her honest-to-goodness smiles - the ones that would light up her face. His anger instantly dissolved into kaput.

“Okay, I absolve you of all sins,” he said jokingly in defeat. “But I'll be the one to make the call.”

“Oh, I'm so glad!” Hermione let out a sigh of relief. The chime of the mantle clock suddenly reminded her of the time. “Well Draco and I have to go… Oh wait, we need to do the spell!”

Hermione cast a glamour spell on herself. In a few seconds, Harry watched as Hermione's hair turned black and sleek. Her skin suddenly had a little olive tint to it. When she turned to him, he noticed that her eyes had turned to a dark blue. Draco too had cast the spell on himself. His skin was a little tanned, and his hair and eyes too were black.

“Just make yourself at home okay?” Hermione said, once again stepping beside Draco. “I'll see you at Ron's?”

Harry ran his fingers through his hair and tiredly nodded.

“I hate you Malfoy,” he said. “So you'd better take care of her!”

“See you Potter,” Draco replied, clasping Hermione once again at the waist, which earned him a roll of the eyes from the woman. “Next time I'll send you an invitation.”

“Sod off!”

Hermione blew Harry a kiss and waved as she disapparated with Draco.

Harry stood where he was for a full minute before letting out a stream of expletives. He took the aluminum can of pumpkin juice that Draco was drinking earlier and crushed it in his hands.

“A bath,” he muttered. “I need a damn good bath!”

XXX

“Ow!” Draco cried out in pain, as they apparated in a back alley. “What was that for?”

“That was a mean joke to play on Harry,” Hermione said, planting a hand to her waist.

“I think my ear fell off,” Draco said, rubbing said ear.

“Well, serves you right!” she replied.

Draco smiled and bragged a bit.

“But it was a good joke, wasn't it?'”

Hermione sighed and started to walk away in long angry strides. Draco was not only curious on how she could walk in those high heels, but he was also marveling at the sight of her legs. Hermione was already good deal away when Draco realized that he was staring long enough. He had to clamber to catch up with her on their way to the building where their suspect was holding his practice.

“What was it for?” Draco asked as if he wasn't walked out on.

“What?” Hermione, still a little annoyed at his insensitivity, was completely at a loss.

“The sigh you did earlier,” he said, capturing her hand in his. They always did this when posing as muggle couples. “What was that for?”

“Nothing,” she replied.

“Nothing?” Draco repeated.

One thing about Draco that Hermione learned during the years of working with him was his tenacity. He never, ever gave up on anything he had set his mind to do, or in this case, to learn.

“Oh,” she admitted in irritation. “Alright, everything's just been out-of-this-world!”

Draco laughed at the expression.

“You mean, even for a witch?”

Hermione got the wit and laughed softly, squeezing Draco's hand.

“Yes,” she said. “Even for a witch.”

And then she related the events of last night from the second Harry apparated in, up to her outburst on learning the news of Harry's break-up.

“I'm surprised Potter hasn't been admitted to St. Mugo's,” Draco supposed, and then laughed as Hermione continued on with the Artie incident. “And wait, Artie asked that? The kid's playing bloody matchmaker!”

Hermione scoffed, the last thing she needed at the moment was a Draco-speculation. Ron had complained earlier about her and her theories. Draco was more than a theorist. He thrived in conspiracy ones, and made it a hobby to prove the truth in them.

“What is there to match make?”

“Why, you and Potter of course!” Draco answered.

“Are you kidding me?” Hermione said, truly and honestly shocked at the idea.

Draco took a second look at her upturned face, and decided that the surprise there was genuine. It was given that Hermione was the smartest witch in the history of Hogwarts, but he never knew she could be a dunce in the obvious department.

“I'm serious,” he retorted. “I mean, you're single, and Potter is too. He is also currently available and nursing a broken heart, which could be advantageous to you. You have known each other since you were children, so you know each other's good points as well as the not-so-appealing habits. Thus, making both of you good candidates for matchmaking!”

Hermione knew it was logical, realistic, rational, or whatever synonyms the word had. However, the idea was so farfetched! Or was it?

“But we're just best friends,” she said, this time not so confidently.

“We're just best friends…” Draco snorted and mimicked her. “And this best friend was the same person who had wanted to take out a vixen named Bianca because she had allegedly used love potion on a guy? And the other best friend was the person who almost messed my good looks this morning? Funny, isn't it?”

“That was a lame argument Draco Malfoy!” Hermione said with a flip of her hair. “Best friends do get jealous too!”

“Alright, whatever you say.”

“Thank you,” Hermione said dignifiedly.

“You're welcome!”

Draco shrugged and since they were soon nearing their destination, decided to pursue a different topic of conversation.

“Hermione?” he asked in a rather grave tone.

“Yeah?”

“Well, if it's not Harry…”

Hermione took her hand from Draco's and faced him.

“Draco, not this again.”

“What?” Draco said with a smile, casually taking back Hermione's hand in his. “You can't blame a guy for trying!”

Hermione would be lying if she said she wasn't flattered by Draco's admiration, but it was just not working with her in THAT way. She hated it when she had to parry his good-natured advances, because she knew that Draco was really serious behind the funny façade. She wished that she could reciprocate the feeling but she couldn't. She felt that there was somebody else for her. And interestingly, she was getting a feeling, one that was making her uncomfortable, that she knew him already. She gritted her teeth. She shouldn't have let Draco put ideas in her head. Now, she was starting to process what her feelings for Harry are exactly. She shoved the thoughts for later, as they were nearing their destination. She needed to fully concentrate on the task at hand, and the last thing she needed was a self-analysis of her relationship with Harry. Work now, work more later. Poor Hermione, she was confused more than ever, and it was all Draco's fault.

She walked closer to his side, and unclasping their entwined hands for the second time hooked her arm through his. She looked up at his face and said, “You're such a great FRIEND, Draco.”

Draco grimaced.

“Ouch,” he mock-winced. “I get the message.”

“You were asking for it!”

Draco, though he was crashed to earth once again, had to laugh at the woman's gumption. Then, he stopped walking and so did Hermione as they reached a rather classy looking building. They looked at each other and nodded grimly. Fun time was over.

Draco looked down at the woman beside him and said, “So Mrs. Smith are you ready?”

Hermione smiled back.

“Ready as ever, Mr. Smith!”