Hermione was the first to see it, late one October night when the wind howled
and the leaves blew and it was easy to believe that the common room was only
safe place in the world.
It was the way they sat, one couch for two boys, their knees just barely
touching and their cheeks stained a red that could not be blamed on the dying
fire.
Odd. Decidedly odd.
There was a chance that it was a one-off, simply a strange little moment in
time, and Hermione was determined to find out for certain. She
spent days observing the evidence, making neat columns of notes in her mind. Together
at breakfast, in the corridors, at lunch fell easily into the "Nothing New
There" category. Not meeting
each other's eyes and Allowing fingers to overlap gratuitously while
passing the peas, on the other hand, did not.
By the time the first snow fell, Hermione had totted up all her figures,
verified her hypothesis, drawn her conclusions. The boys were still clueless, still two steps behind her -
just like always. But for once, she didn't mind; it gave her time.
Hermione saw it first, and it broke her heart.
Somewhere in the back of her mind, in a place where thoughts were less words and
more a colouring of reality, she had tagged them as her boys.
Hers to take care of, hers to fuss over, and hers to choose between one
day in the settling-down future. She'd
never exactly said it, even to herself; it was just there, beneath
practical day-to-day Hermione, under classes and homework and practising spells.
There were brittle icicles on the window-ledge the day she felt herself crack,
watching them (fussing unnecessarily over who sat beside whom in the library),
and Hermione did the only thing she knew how to do, and buried her nose in a
book.
They were still her boys, she thought finally, peering overtop the pages.
Seeing that helped mend the edges, just a little.
They were still her boys – and the first one to hurt the other would
answer to her.
*****
Thanks to Zelda Ophelia for beta, and Calliope14 for the title and encouragement.