Disclaimer: Anything you recognize I don't own
Okay, so this isn't a new story. A little while ago I deleted the whole thing with the intention of editing and re-uploading. Well, life got in the way. However, I did manage to get this much edited. The rest may be slow going, but it'll all eventually be re-uploaded with edits. Just note that if you read this before, there are some noticeable changes.
Hermione Granger liked to think of herself as an intelligent well organized person, but today that was not the case. From the moment she had received an emergency page from the hospital her whole day had been in total chaos. When she arrived in the ward where she worked as one of the healers, she was met with a dozen witches and wizards with some sort of purple oozing substance stuck to their skin. And from the cries of the patients it was apparently burning the skin underneath.
"What is going on?" She asked as she arrived at the nurses' station.
Harriet, who had been working in the hospital since Hermione was a baby, glanced up at her looking completely disgruntled and out of her wits. A quick look at the schedule on the desk confirmed that yet again, Harriet's much younger counterpart had not shown up in time for her shift, leaving Harriet to work overtime.
"I was just about to send Jasmine a howler when this lot came in claiming they were at some party when the cake exploded." Harriet replied. "From the looks of things it's a good thing no one had eaten any of the cake yet."
With a nod of thanks to Harriet, Hermione turned her attention to the people waiting covered in purple goo.
"Can anyone tell me what happened here?" She asked, folding her arms across her chest. "I can't possibly begin to accurately help any of you until I know what exactly happened."
All ten started to talk at once further confusing Hermione and only prolonging their treatment until a deep authoritative voice cut them off from the back.
"I can tell you what happened, Granger."
Hermione looked up in shock as Draco Malfoy made his way to the front of the group, purple goo covering his entire left arm.
"Whoever baked the cake must have slipped a little something extra in it, especially since it was a Malfoy Potions Incorporated party." He explained.
"Any idea what was slipped into the cake?" She asked with an arched eyebrow.
"I don't think it really matters, Granger. How about you start fixing us up? Starting with me of course."
"What is your pain level, Malfoy?" Hermione asked as she inspected his arm.
He didn't answer, instead he arched a brow as if to say nothing could hurt him. Hermione rolled her eyes and after taking a closer look waved her wand over his arm, watching in satisfaction as the goo disappeared and the burns were covered with a burn balm of her own making.
"There, it should be healed by morning. Just make sure not to wash it off tonight. Next!"
With that said Hermione dismissed Draco Malfoy without a second look, already moving onto a girl with goo over a good portion of her face. At first Draco was disgruntled that he was dismissed so easily but reminded himself that it was only Hermione Granger and he had much better things to do than wait in the hospital longer than necessary anyway.
So after settling with the nurse behind the desk, Draco made his way out of St. Mungos and into the night air. So, his employee party to boost morale had not gone as planned thanks to the baker he had hired to bake the cake. He would be paying her a visit in the morning. As for his employees, he had to think of a way to make it up to them. They had dealt with a lot just by being associated with his name for a long time. But now that the war wasn't in the forefront of people's minds and most people seemed to recognize Draco for the man he was now, he wanted to erase any doubt left in his employees' minds. It seemed he would be going with his secretary's idea from the beginning: give them all a raise after paying for all of their hospital bills, of course.
Bloody baker. What had he ever done to her? He didn't even know the girl. His secretary had recommended her after having visited her little bake shop and sampling some of her delightful cupcakes. Honestly, all he could remember about his encounter with her was that she had an accent-probably American- and her bakeshop was decorated with pineapples, which made absolutely no sense to him since it was a bake shop and not a fruit stand.
Once in his flat for the night Draco headed down the hall to his bedroom, tugging at his tie as he did so. He had just pulled his shirt off when he noticed the figure lying across his bed passed out. With a quick glance at the clock, Draco let out a sigh and went to wake her.
"Jasmine!"
"What?!" She screamed as she bolted upright.
"Shouldn't you be at the hospital?" He asked.
"Bloody hell, Harriet is going to kill me!"
With that said she quickly grabbed her jacket, slipped on her shoes and apparated out of the flat. Draco shook his head and continued to shed his clothes. His relationship with Jasmine was a weird one. It had all started about eight months ago when Jasmine had moved to the city for her new job at St. Mungos. They had met up at a bar on her first night in the city and had a one night stand. However, the next morning after an awkward minute after waking up she just started talking to him and he found himself responding. Since then they had stayed out of bed and instead had developed some strange sort of friendship with one another. Most days it felt like Jasmine lived in his flat instead of her own across town. She wouldn't admit it to him, but he was pretty sure she was afraid of her neighbor. This reminded him that he needed to take care of that issue on the morrow as well. He liked Jasmine, he really did, but he was sick of finding her girly articles around his house, especially when he brought home dates.
After making sure he wasn't about to sleep amongst Jasmine's under things, Draco slipped into bed with a sigh of contentment, careful to keep his left arm free from the covers so the balm wouldn't rub off. Then with his last thought of pineapples, purple goo, and Granger swimming around in his head, he drifted off to sleep.
Xxx
"Draco Malfoy was in here earlier?" Jasmine asked in surprise as she reviewed the charts from before she arrived for her shift.
Hermione Granger glanced down at her as she signed a form for a patient. "Yes, apparently, there was a cake exploding accident at his party."
"Oh no." Jasmine sighed. "He wanted things to go well!"
Hermione's brow crinkled, "Do you know Draco Malfoy?"
Jasmine nodded, "We're friends. He didn't say anything when I saw him before I got here. Is he okay?"
"The goo left behind minor burns on all of the victims, but nothing a little burn balm won't fix. They'll all be as good as new in the morning."
Jasmine sighed, "Let's hope that's the worst of our emergencies tonight."
"You know Jasmine, Harriet is getting too old to stick around as late as she does when you're late for your shift." Hermione said kindly.
"I know. I just have troubles sleeping and when I finally fall asleep, which is usually in the worst possible place, I don't wake up that easily."
"Maybe you need to see a Healer yourself. Healer Robbins may be able to help you."
Jasmine shook her head, "What I need is to move. My neighbor scares me and, half the time I'm awake at night because I imagine him breaking his way into my flat to have his wicked way with me."
"Do you know who he is?"
"Yes, his name is-"
Xxx
"Theo?!" Draco gasped in surprise as the door opened to reveal Theodore Nott clad in a pair of flannel pajama bottoms and an old Slytherin shirt.
Theo Nott was the neighbor Jasmine was scared of? Of course, as Draco looked him over he could easily see how that could be so. He wasn't exactly the kind of bloke who looked warm and inviting. In fact he looked down right mean at the moment. That could be from the hangover he was suffering from, if the smell of fire whiskey was any indication.
"What the bloody hell are you doing here, Malfoy?" He growled.
"I know the girl who lives across the hall from you and, while she won't admit it, she's afraid of you which means she spends half of her time at my place instead of her own."
Theo scoffed, "Usually that wouldn't be a problem for you, Malfoy."
Draco ran a hand through his hair, "Well, in this case it is. She's my friend and she keeps leaving all of her stuff around my flat. So, be less scary."
"This is how I am."
"Sloshed twenty four seven?"
"Pretty much."
"What happened to you?"
"Well, first there was the war and after that it's none of your damn business. Look, tell your friend she has nothing to worry about from me. I hardly even leave the flat so I'm definitely nothing for her to worry about."
Draco nodded his head, it was obvious that there was a lot going on with Nott and quite frankly he didn't know the guy well enough anymore to stick his nose into it. Besides, he was pretty sure that once Jasmine found out that Draco knew who her neighbor was she would make him help the guy out. So for now he would take the easy way out.
"Alright, thanks." And with that Draco walked away and headed towards the bake shop on his next mission.
Just as he remembered, the place was painted yellow with green accents, pineapple pictures and figurines all over the place. Not to mention the real pineapples that acted as centerpieces for each of her tables. Draco thought he had read somewhere that pineapples were a symbol for welcome, but this was taking it to the extreme.
Once he got past looking at all the pineapples he walked to the counter and rang the bell. A minute later the infamous baker walked out of the back, an apron tied around her waist which clearly had done nothing to keep the flour from covering half of her torso, forehead, and nose.
"Ah, Mr. Malfoy," She smiled pleasantly, "how was your cake?"
Draco narrowed his eyes, "I'll tell you how it was: it bloody exploded! Some goo substance exploded out and burned me and my employees!"
The baker's eyes were wide as she gazed into the heated glance of Draco Malfoy. "It exploded?"
"Yes, that's what I said." Draco snapped, sort of hating how mean he sounded at the moment, but knowing he had every right to be upset. However, she looked so frightened and confused and that only made him feel like a big bully.
"Oh no! I know what happened!" She cried. "While I was making the cake an owl came in to deliver a package and knocked over a bunch of things on my shelf. I checked to make sure nothing had gotten in the cake but I must have missed something!"
Draco arched a brow, "So, this has nothing to do with who I am?"
"No, it was a complete mistake, Mr. Malfoy, please forgive me! I'll even make you another cake free of charge, in fact, I'll make as many as you want!"
She seemed pretty sincere to Draco and the earnest look on her face only made him feel more like a bully. So, gentling his tone he said: "Excuse me, but I didn't seem to catch your name."
"Meredith Evans."
"Right. So, Ms. Evans you don't know who I am?"
Meredith shrugged, "If you are referring to your family's involvement in the first and second wizarding wars then yes, I know who you are. However, I grew up in America away from all of the politics that drove the wars and have no interest in who you once were. It is obvious to me, and from your desire to make sure I don't view you as a villain, that I know that you are a changed person. My exploding cake was not a personal attack if that's what you're thinking. Is everyone alright?"
Draco shook his head in disbelief. This Meredith Evans was a perceptive one and a little shocking at the same time. Draco took a minute to study her. Her dark brown hair was pulled up in a high pony tail, specks of flour mixed in here and there. And behind her glasses were a pair of matching brown eyes that seemed to be able to read him much too well.
"Yes, everyone is as good as new this morning. So alright, how about a second shot, Ms. Evans?" He asked suddenly. "How about you bake a cake for me only to show me what kind of skills you possess? Then, I can decide whether I want to use your services again, without the exploding cake as my only reference point."
She smiled, "On one condition: I can make you whatever I want."
"Deal."
Xxx
After finishing his business with the baker, Meredith Evans, Draco had arrived at work in a surprisingly good mood. Unfortunately, his employees from the night before hadn't been in quite the same mood. However, after quickly consulting with his trusted secretary, Mrs. Poppin, Draco made the announcement that they would all be receiving a raise, along with an increase to their Christmas bonuses. That sure brightened them up.
So when Draco arrived home he was in a pretty good mood…that was until he saw Jasmine passed out on his bed once again, drooling on his expensive silk coverlet. Draco rolled his eyes as he yanked off his tie. Did the girl not know how to turn down the covers? Even better, did she not know how to go to her own bed?
With that thought in mind Draco slapped her arse…hard. Jasmine woke with a start and immediately grabbed her stinging butt as she looked up at Draco in annoyance.
"You prat!"
Draco chuckled, "You're the one in my bed and, since we don't shag anymore I'd rather you stay out of my bed."
Her eyes turned pleading in the blink of an eye. Gone was the look of annoyance and in its place were the puppy dog eyes that Draco had a hard time resisting.
"Look, I paid a visit to your neighbor today. You have nothing to fear, I know the guy. He's harmless, just a drunk. So, gather your stuff and settle back into your own apartment and drool on your own coverlet."
Jasmine looked down at the wet stain of drool sheepishly, "Oops."
"Yeah oops, now you know I love you and all that stuff, but get out."
It took her a few minutes to realize he was completely serious. When she did understand she quickly gathered all of her stuff and headed to his fire place.
"I can still come and visit right?"
Draco shook his head, "But like a normal person who knocks and calls ahead."
"I get it. But if I am harmed it's on you, Draco Malfoy."
Draco laughed, "I'll never be able to live with myself."
Jasmine rolled her eyes and stepped into the fire place. Draco watched from his bed as she grabbed a hand full of powder, shouted her address, and was gone in a flash of green flames. Once she was gone though, Draco felt a pang…of loneliness? Impossible, he'd been wanting solitude for weeks, but every time he had thought to have some Jasmine had been in his apartment drooling somewhere on expensive silk. He shook his head, trying to get rid of the pang. He didn't need Jasmine here. Without Jasmine here he could finally bring a witch home without worrying about Jasmine being here to cramp his style.
Xxx
After being so rudely awakened a half hour ago at Draco's, Jasmine found it impossible to once again fall asleep despite the fact she had been up since the early morning hours working at the hospital and had another shift at one in the morning.
With a heavy sigh, Jasmine rolled out of her own bed which was most certainly not covered in anything near as expensive as silk, and went to take a shower. If she couldn't sleep she figured she may as well be productive and stock her apartment with food since it was clear that Draco was sick of her presence at the moment. Not that she blamed him. If she was honest with herself she had been a little ridiculous with her fear of the neighbor, but she hated living alone. Before moving to the city she had lived with her family in the quiet countryside. The city was a scary place, especially for a much sheltered Jasmine. What had she done the first night in the city? Had drunken sex with a total stranger who could have been a murderer. Thankfully, it had been Draco and now they were pretty good friends, but she may not be so lucky the next time. Not that she had any plans to have drunken sex with anyone anytime soon.
Once she was ready to make a public appearance, Jasmine grabbed her wand and purse and walked out of her flat. Just as she turned from locking the door she noticed that her neighbor was standing across the hall, having just come out of his flat, and was staring at her curiously. Jasmine's eyes went wide as she stared at him in shock.
She didn't care what Draco said about knowing him and him being nothing more than a drunk because at the moment he looked pretty bloody scary to her. He had to be over six feet to her small five foot one frame and his shoulders were just about as wide as the doorway! And his hair! It was dark as sin with eyes to match!
"You must be Malfoy's friend." He muttered as he took in the small girl before him. She was obviously scared at him, if the way she clutched her wand was any indication, and suddenly he felt bad that he had caused her unnecessary worry just because he had been too drunk to be a normal neighbor.
"Look, you have nothing to worry about with me. I apologize for moving in here and being a drunken arse too impolite to properly greet my neighbors. I've been having a rough time of it, but seeing Malfoy yesterday snapped me out of it for the time being."
She said nothing and continued to stare at him like a deer caught in the headlights. If he didn't feel so awful for causing her to have to sleep somewhere else for weeks he would have found it funny. But instead of laughing he took a step forward and held out his hand.
"I'm Theo Nott."
It took her a while and a lot of staring at his large hand, before she cautiously placed one of her much smaller hands in his.
"Jasmine Bishop."
Xxx
Shortly after lunch a knock sounded on Draco's office door. Mrs. Poppin had left on her lunch break to check on her husband, so he honestly had no idea who could be knocking at the moment.
"Come in." He called out cautiously.
A second later the door opened and Meredith Evans walked into his office confidently, holding containers filled with her confections. Draco licked his lips as he took in the number of treats she had brought for him to taste and looked up in surprise when Meredith let out a laugh.
"Looks like you have no worries that I'm going to accidentally poison you or have something explode on you again." Meredith chuckled. "Well, I didn't; I was extra careful this time and no owls were around the shop either."
"So what do you have for me?" Draco asked eagerly, feeling like a first year eagerly awaiting the desert segment of Christmas feast at Hogwarts.
"I thought to myself why just make you one thing? So, I decided to bring you a piece of everything I offer at the shop. However, I didn't decorate you a cake, you'll just have to take my word that I am excellent at it."
Draco nodded his head, "Of course."
"So, first let's start with my cheesecakes."
What followed was probably the best hour of Draco Malfoy's life to date. Every bite was an orgasm in his mouth and, as a man who had had quite a few excellent orgasms in his life he knew what he was talking about. The only thing that could possibly make Meredith's deserts better were if he were to eat them off of a beautiful woman!
"Last but not least, red velvet cake with my special cream cheese frosting. However, I decided to put a twist on it since I'm sure your favorite color is not red."
When she removed the foil Draco saw that instead of the traditional red of red velvet cake, his was green. He smirked in satisfaction as he picked the piece of cake up and shoved it into his mouth gleefully. He was sure that the color didn't make any difference in its taste, but he was also sure that this was the best piece of cake he had ever had in his life.
"I can see from your surprisingly expressive face that you enjoyed that as well as everything else I have placed before you today. I think I can confidently say that I'll be seeing more of your business?" Meredith smiled.
"Absobloodylutely." Draco sighed as he took a napkin to his face and wiped off the cake crumbs from the corners of his mouth.
Meredith then set to work gathering up her containers and once she was done she looked back to Draco who was slowly finishing his last piece of his cake.
"Well, have nice afternoon, Mr. Malfoy." She smiled and then breezed out of his office, leaving Draco behind in a sugar coma.
Draco stared after her a minute, "I'm sure I can find some sort of excuse to need a cake made soon."
Xxx
As luck would have it, Draco did have an excuse to call upon Ms. Evan's cake baking services within the few weeks that followed his afternoon of baked good ecstasy. As one of the head nurses in her ward, it had fallen on Jasmine to organize the work birthday parties this year. And since it was September that meant she had to organize a party for Hermione Granger.
Unfortunately, Jasmine was a bit of a procrastinator and had put off party planning until only a few days before Hermione's birthday on the , finding herself in a pickle, Jasmine rushed to Draco for help.
Draco, of course, was more than happy to help Jasmine out in this cause. After instructing her to call upon his personal party planner he assured her that he would take care of the cake. So, with a smile on his face, a few mornings before the nineteenth Draco walked into Meredith's little shop and rang the bell.
Meredith emerged from the back, a layer of flour coating her as usual. When she saw Draco behind the counter she smiled.
"What can I do for you, Mr. Malfoy?"
"I need to have a cake made for someone's birthday. I think your red velvet would be perfect since she is a former Gryffindor."
Meredith raised her brows, "A Gryffindor huh?"
Draco nodded, "It's my friend's co worker. She's a procrastinator and I assured her I would handle the cake. So, the cake doesn't need to be fancy as it's just a work party, maybe a small three tier with flowers or something. Oh, and her name is Hermione.
Meredith's eyes grew wide, "Hermione Granger?"
"Yeah."
"Oh, don't worry; I know exactly what to do. I'll deliver it personally. When's the party?"
"Noon on the nineteenth at St. Mungos."
Xxx
Hermione loved her birthdays. However, she hated her birthdays when they fell on work days. It wasn't because she didn't like working on her birthday, she was Hermione Granger after all, but she didn't like the little awkwardly put together party thrown together at the last minute by one of her coworkers. Unfortunately for her, her birthday not only fell on a work day but it was Jasmine's duty to plan it. Hermione liked Jasmine, but it was common knowledge that she was forgetful and often late to everything. Hermione was dreading whatever was in store for her with this party…if there was even a party to be dreading.
However, when Jasmine arrived on time to work with a pleasant smile on her face, Hermione began to wonder if today was going to go a little different than she expected. That was until she spied Draco Malfoy lurking around the ward for Jasmine. Hermione still didn't know what the full extent of their relationship was, however it was apparent that they had formed some sort of friendship… which she found odd because of the way the two of them were.
Although Jasmine had attended school in France, it was obvious that had she gone to Hogwarts she would have been placed in Hufflepuff, which meant that she was the kind of person that Draco would have been absolutely annoyed by years ago.
As she continued to watch him a hand came out of the conference room where her party was to be and dragged him inside, leaving Hermione alone in the hallway besides the few nurses roaming about from room to room.
"Healer Granger, you have a visitor." One of the nurses called from the nurses' station.
Putting down her stack of charts, Hermione headed for the station and smiled when Ginny Potter turned to her with a smile and a cup of Hermione's favorite hot chocolate in hand. Hermione smiled as she approached her best friend's wife and what would have been her own sister in law if fate had worked a little differently. Unfortunately, Ginny and Hermione would never become sisters because only a year ago Ron had died in an accident while on a mission for the Ministry.
"Happy Birthday Hermione!" Ginny beamed. "Harry and I were talking about how much you hate your work parties, so today I decided I would attend and see if I couldn't help make it a bit more bearable for you."
Hermione smiled, "Thanks Gin, but what about the baby?"
Six months ago Ginny had given birth to their first child, James, who was a spitting image of his father from the moment of birth.
"He's with Mum and it's not as if I'll be gone for that long. These things only last about an hour right?"
Hermione nodded, "Yes, but feel free to leave whenever you want. They're not that exciting, trust me. And the food is usually rubbish."
"Well, that's why I brought you this." Ginny replied as she handed Hermione the cup of hot chocolate.
Of course it was at that moment that Hermione spied a woman approaching levitating a large box marked: FRAGILE towards the conference room. Ginny and Hermione watched as she disappeared inside and then turned to each other with hopeful looks on their faces.
"I think this year your party might be a little different." Ginny smiled.
Sure enough ten minutes later saw the two of them in the conference room with all the other healers and nurses of the ward singing 'Happy Birthday' to Hermione. Usually Hermione would have been blushing and trying to avoid everyone's eyes as she suffered through the embarrassing birthday ritual, but this time her eyes were trained on what had been inside that giant box.
It was a cake that was for sure. But not the kind of birthday cakes Hermione had had in her life. Sure, when she had turned seventeen her parents had gone to a bakery and had a special cake made, but it had been nothing more than a large sheet cake. The base of this cake was shaped and designed as a book and on top were the symbols of the Healer. It was amazing.
After the song was over, Hermione made her way over to where the girl that had carried the cake in stood. She seemed nervous as she saw Hermione approaching, but put a smile on her face nonetheless.
"Hello, I'm Hermione." Hermione greeted with a smile.
"Meredith." She replied.
"Did you make this cake?"
Meredith nodded, "Mr. Malfoy commissioned me to make it. He wasn't sure what you would like so I took the liberty of taking what I knew about you and designed this cake."
Hermione smiled, although she was puzzled as to why Draco Malfoy would commission a birthday cake for her. "It's lovely. I almost hate the thought of cutting it up and serving it!"
Meredith grinned, "It's a red velvet cake, which I have been told is my best recipe."
"It is." Draco smirked as he approached. "Go ahead and slice it up, Granger. The rest of us are eager to taste that cake."
Hermione watched as Meredith rolled her eyes at Draco and suddenly understood why Malfoy was here in the first place. He was, of course, friends with Jasmine who had been tasked with Hermione's birthday party. And because Jasmine was a notorious procrastinator she had turned to her friend for help and, because he seemed to enjoy Meredith's cakes so well it all made sense. However, she found that she didn't care. He had paid for a very lovely cake for her hadn't he?
"Alright," Hermione nodded, "but I get the first piece."
"Of course you do!" Meredith exclaimed. "You are the birthday girl after all."
With that said Meredith grabbed her knife and started to serve up the cake. As promised the first piece was handed to Hermione, who examined the beautiful red color in awe. She knew that there was nothing more to it than red food coloring, but that didn't take away the sense of novelty that red velvet cake had. So as everyone watched, Hermione took her first bite and found that she had to bite back the embarrassing moan that almost slipped out of her mouth as she chewed.
"This is delicious!"
"I'm glad you like it."
"Yes, it's all very lovely." Draco interrupted. "Where's my piece?"
