They say people can change. Not in a week or a month or even a year but hey - that's time. Persistent and unyielding, weathering away stone and sand until pebbles and glass were all that remained. That's how change happens, with the crest and trough of the saltwater waves. It's what Hermione sees when she looks at him, cheeks flushed and skin damp, back sticking to the thousand count Egyptian cotton sheets.
Both she and he are very discreet during this time - the house elves clean up most everything but Hermione is a perfectionist. She'll never leave anything behind, refuses to allow his wife to discover a moderately priced earring in her marble soap dish. Astoria isn't home very often, preferring to live abroad with a male harem in tow; thus, the opportunity for a confrontation was far and few in between.
Hermione thanks Merlin for small mercies.
Despite his outward demeanor, Hermione finds that he is one of the most punctual men she's ever had the pleasure to encounter. His schedule is organized to precise and perfect increments, he knows how every time slot should be filled and which representative to meet with next; administrative savvy is key in business and Draco possesses this talent in abundance. It's why when Hermione wakes alone in his great bed, naked and somewhat forlorn, she makes her way to the kitchen, unsurprised by the China teacup that awaits her.
Its delicate white contrasts with his black marble floors, the petite size juxtaposing his high vaulted ceilings and arched doorways. Malfoy Manor is a monstrous, cold labyrinth whose empty extravagance can be filled with a single teacup. Hermione smiles at the thought, hands coming to grasp the little thing.
She sips the cold hazelnut coffee he has house elves make just for her.
Hermione likes cold coffee. Likes it even more in Malfoy Manor, her one American fixation trampling down centuries of pureblood tradition.
He took her to the opera once.
The Malfoy family has a decadently reserved box perched on the highest echelons of curved Tuscan architecture, the Teatro di San Carlo. It possessed brilliant vermillion seats, creme d'or piers, bell petaled gas lamps, and a handprinted ceiling of faded sky blue, saintly figures blessing the virtuoso below. Hermione had been enchanted the moment she entered its pale marble foyer - but beauty elevated to piety once Adriana began, her violet sopranos coloring the hall.
Draco had sat beside her, silent and watching, though she wasn't sure if he was looking at her or the production. Hermione had been too focused on Adriana and the tragic foolishness of Maurizio.
Afterward she had discussed and analyzed and talked, talked, talked away as they drove through quiet Neapolitan streets, dim yellow gas lamps seeping through tinted windows, shadowing her and Draco.
"What a malevolent, ill tempered princess. Horrific in her desire to murder, don't you agree?"
His answer was noncommittal.
"I understand the need to humanize her anger to a devastation unique to her derived persona but honestly! A princess! The difference between woman and title was a bit more brazen than needed to be but oh! The music was beautiful. Thank you Draco. Thank you for taking me here."
"Not at all." he absently placed a kiss on her hand, lips warm against her bare skin, breath ghosting over her knuckles as he leaned back.
"Didn't you like it?"
"I did."
She frowned. "How many times have you seen it?"
"Just once." he turned, gray eyes meeting brown. "With you."
Hermione - for all her intellect - allowed relief to take over.
(Never mind then, she pushed her mind to reiterate, never mind that Astoria prefers the ballet.)
It took Hermione a while to realize he never took her to the same place twice. Perhaps it was because he wanted to show her all the world before coming back to cement their memories; perhaps he wanted to wait. She didn't mind the constant traveling, how Draco seemed to prefer London to any other foreign destination.
The sentimental, sweeter part of her wanted to make London their home. Wanted him to purchase a flat in the city and escape that marble mausoleum he locked himself in. Things were always brighter in the city; bustling streets, hurrying people, a cacophony of sound from train whistles to street vendors to wheelbarrows slicing through cobblestone. Hermione missed intercity life with a passion; she had her work at the Ministry but there was only so much time one could spend there without sleep.
She wanted a definite. Something tangible and solid.
Draco's word was beginning to mean more than it ever should.
She asked him about Naples, he took her to Sicily.
"Best to avoid Borgia territory." he teased lightly, the rarest of smiles on his face, one that reached his charcoal gray eyes.
Hermione said nothing, kept her head bent as she searched the menu. "I can't speak much Italian. What's this say?" she pointed to a random item that vaguely sounded like arsenic.
"Arancini." the word flowing from his lips cool and rich as Chateau d'Yquem. Hermione tilted her face towards him, the allure of wine and intoxication already washing over her. "It's messy." Draco declared. "In essence, a stuffed rice ball of ragù, mozzarella, and peas. Childish, really."
Hermione raised a brow, skeptical. They weren't exactly middle aged.
"You could do with some laughter in your life." she sniffed, not wanting to look him in the eye again. "You already dress like a fifty year old man."
"It's called professionalism."
She didn't miss the faint quirk of his lips.
"Excuse me?"
He was smirking openly now, looking every bit as arrogant and cosseted as he did during their Hogwarts years. "Professionalism." he repeated and Hermione knew he'd caught her staring at his mouth. "The proper definition for a man who manages billions in a high rise complex of glass and steel."
"You don't have to dress like you're going to your own funeral."
"Then your work at the Ministry must be like that of a mortician."
She glared at his quip.
He smirked at her scowl.
In the end, he allowed her to get that babyish arancini (though he didn't eat a bite).
He took her to France. (Well, more like she took him to France but the payment was in Malfoy's name.)
They lodged in a tiny town in Brittany called Dinan, a place so filled with history, cobblestone, and art that Hermione could scarcely breathe without swooning. It was medieval in the most charming, fairytale sense - sepia and antique tones everywhere - save the overflowing baskets of bright red peonies hanging out of peoples windows.
Hermione loved this town best of all but Draco had not a smile to share. The only words she could coax out of him had been brief, biting retorts that fell easily and readily on her open wounds.
She knew their story was over the moment they left Dinan.
He had his personal assistant send her a letter apologizing for any inconveniences he may have caused her and that was the end of that. No drawn out goodbyes were necessary on his part but Hermione felt cheated in the worst way. Debased and cut open like a sideshow attraction that the ringmaster was tired of.
Why, she wanted to scream at herself, why were you stupid enough to invest so much hope in a relationship too fragile to last? Butterfly's wings, dried violets. They were the remains of love affairs that ought to have been called lust affairs. For her entire life Hermione had prided herself on logic and theory, in unraveling the thought process, absorbing the important bits, and moving on.
Yet she had been blindsided by that too common ailment, that sickness of the heart. She indulged a fantasy that was nothing more than smoke and stardust.
Del verso io son l'accento, l'eco del dramma uman/il fragile strumento.
Translation: I'm the verse's music, the echo of human drama/the fragile instrument.
Opera is Adriana Lecouvreur by Francesco Cilea.
A/N: Written b/c of writer's block.