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When I was twenty-six and apparently still capable of making catastrophically bad life decisions I enrolled in a Muggle postgraduate program for advanced theoretical chemistry. (Or, as the magical world insists on calling it, “additional alchemy-adjacent PhD work.”)
I wanted to understand the science behind magic: molecular structures, reactive compounds, the logic beneath intuition. It felt… grounding. Safe. Normal.
Until the first day of class.
Because the professor walked in, and it was Draco Malfoy.
I hadn’t seen him in years.
Gone were the sharp edges of Malfoy Manor arrogance. He wore a crisp shirt, sleeves rolled, hair tied loosely back, and he spoke about reaction rates and volatile compounds like they were poetry. His voice was steady, low, precise. Every sentence sounded like a spell.
He didn’t acknowledge me. Not at first.
But every time he said “Miss Granger,” it sounded like a secret.
There was also a Muggle boy in my program who was sweet, friendly, painfully persistent and who always sat beside me and found excuses to talk. He shared his notes whenever I spaced out (which happened a lot, because unfortunately my brain kept wandering to the fact that Draco Malfoy existed in the front of the room and somehow knew how to use a projector).
The boy kept asking me out. Just one date. Just coffee. Just dinner. He was harmless… but relentless.
So I finally made a deal with him.
“If you can ask the professor a question he answers incorrectly, I’ll say yes to one date.”
He thought about it for a long time.
Then, during lecture, he raised his hand.
“Professor, do you think Hermione would go out with me tonight?”
The room went silent.
Draco didn’t blink. Didn’t hesitate. Didn’t even look up from the equations he was writing.
“No.”
The boy laughed awkwardly, trying to play it off.
“Okay, how about dinner, then?”
Draco paused, just for a heartbeat, before replying, voice firm and final:
“She already has dinner plans.”
Class ended. Students filed out. My heart was pounding so hard I felt dizzy.
I stayed behind.
When the door closed, Draco finally turned to me, eyes softer than I remembered.
I swallowed. “Why did you say no? With such… certainty?”
He stepped closer. Just enough that I could smell clove soap and potion oil.
And he said:
“Because you’re having dinner with me.”
That was the night I stopped pretending I’d ever moved on.
And the night I started dating my former rival, former enemy…
…and my now-partner of five years.