Disclaimer: The characters and canon situations in the following story belong solely to JK Rowling, Scholastic and WB. I am not making any money from the publishing or writing of this story.

General Notes: I started this as a vague idea and I know I'm in the habit of never picking an ending that I like so be warned that the ending you expect might not be within any of the chapters to come. Given that, if you like this story, I've written about a dozen chapters and it's a downhill rolling snowball trying to get to the bottom.

Bear with if you see formatting and general errors as I tend to write sporadically through my bursts of time and thought.

Had Bell and Watson Not Tried

Chapter 1

I'll see you then. No, they never spoke such trite any longer. Maybe, if she thought back far enough, maybe once upon a time one, if not both of them bothered to say goodbye to the other. No, she sat at the table staring out the window as he dressed. She could see his reflection in the mirror to her left and could see what her mind knew.

He had gotten the owl just barely an hour ago and from a hurried attempt to respond, to the realization that he was required, she knew he was going. He only bothered to respond when it was truly important. Their time together was limited enough as it was, the fact that someone was foolish enough reach him was problem enough. No, truly life requiring matters interrupted their time. She didn't bother to inquire, his work was important, his life outside of them was what mattered to him and this moment of theirs was an afterthought. She was just as guilty and for how much they both treated it as second best in their respective lives, she kept hers a more guarded secret than he could know.

A piece of buttered toast hung between his lips as he finished getting his things together. She saw him throw a few things here and there into his bag. It was an extended weekend they had set aside but after two days, he had received the owl that couldn't and wouldn't be ignored.

Had things been different, she would've found reasons to be angry but she wasn't. She knew that she was just as likely to leave him if the missive came for her. It was getting more frequent for either of them to get such missives, calling them back. On some occasions, they had both received the call back to reality within hours of each other. No, it was just him called back this time.

She could remember a time where he would ignore it. He would tell the owl to leave as he couldn't be bothered and could care less to respond. Their youth had let them have such luxuries. Now after all these years and the responsibilities of their lives packed on, it wasn't an option to do so.

He sighed.

His youthful face was scrunched up as he gave a last check to the damage he had done in his haste. At best they only packed for a weekend away. Neither ever brought anything with them that was important or telling of the world they left behind, it simply wouldn't do. Even if he forgot something, she couldn't see it being so important that he couldn't replace. Everything in his life was replaceable, even her. She saw the gossip rags on her daily walks to work, there was always someone in his life. He was never without company of some kind if he was truly bored.

It was a given that she knew, but it was also a given she simply didn't and wouldn't ask. He was with her when he wanted to and not with them. If he wanted to be with someone else, he would be.

The rush of having him for a few days at a time was a silly euphoria in her youth, a fling while on vacation from her regular life. He was bright, he kept her on her toes but given reality, the fantasy of a few days was better than the truth of what she was doing with him.

`Click`

He had left with the closing of the door.

No parting kisses.

No lingering goodbye.

No promise of another time or a chance to make it up to her.

No, that youthful hope of something else was gone.

They had striped their relations to the basics of what they were.

A fantasy from their respective realities.

If only was that much worse, maybe one of them would try to change things.

No, reality was survivable and tolerable, why rock that boat with this one?

She waited a decent time before giving the room a quick once over herself. She hadn't even got far in taking anything out of her own bag. A dress for dinner last night, some essentials in the bathroom and a few stray articles of clothing. Their four day weekend was literally cut in half.

Pulling out her wand, she summoned them all back in her bag. She would sort them out once she was home.

Like him, she sighed and gave the room a once over. Magic made sure she got it all but that didn't stop her from wanting a visual.

Nodding, she picked up the phone by the nightstand and calling the front desk.

"Yes, I'd like to check out please."

The desk clerk reviewed the room information with her before asking if she had a good stay.

"It was lovely."

She could hear the clicking as they typed something into the computer to fulfill her request.

"Yes, Malfoy." She was tempted to spell it as the clerk took his time in verifying the information.

"No, I don't really care about the rest of the reservation." She doubted Draco would care or notice if he would be charged for the half day they had used.

"No, the spa reservation is not to be billed with the room." It was the one concession to their time away, she would pamper herself usually at the spa of whatever place they stayed at before she left. It was her treat to herself that had nothing to do with him.

"Yes, Lagrange. No, the name on the card is Hermione Granger." She never made her reservations under her real name. Sadly, when it came to the bill, there was no way to avoid the usage of her real name. "I will settle that when I leave."

It was a few more minutes and she had effectively checked them out.

Shrinking her bag, she exited the room for her treat.

She could use a few hours of forgetting.

She needed to forget she had come here with him.

She needed to forget he had left.

She needed to forget so she could remember why she ever came with him at all.

Jean Lagrange.

She lived for all her life Hermione Granger.

For her moments of fantasy, she was Jean Lagrange.

It was a byproduct of her life that she would carry a cloak and dagger element about her. Mad-eye Moody's constant vigilance was ingrained into her. She had taken to going into the muggle world under an assumed name when she ventured alone. She glamoured her looks with heavy dose of disillusion charms in order to appear different while also giving an air of forget me not to those who might think her changed look was familiar. It was after the war when her parents were finally returned to English soil and she was home with them. In that time, she cultivated her doubled appearance. Without Harry or Ron flanking her moves, she was just one witch trying to live when the world was rebuilding.

Her parents were readjusting to their return, life was back to the way it was before the war but they were still unsettled. In their eyes, their little girl had fought in a war while they lived the carefree life. They had a hard time reconciling war heroine with the girl they went on trips to the library with and worried about being bullied in school. So, she took time out her life to enjoy time with them.

She spent the summer after Hogwarts helping air out the house and getting settled. She had asked her university to defer her start for a year while she took classes at a muggle institution. It gave her time to be nearer her parents while still moving on from the war as well.

It was then that Jean and Draco met.

She had just left from her dinner with Harry and Ron only to drift about muggle London aimlessly that night. In a very much unguarded moment, she forgot she was a witch and fancied herself some Fresher out for the night. There would always be an element of danger in wandering the streets at night for any female or person for that matter. So when he had stumbled into her from the alleyway, she was panicked.

She had figured that in her moment of weakness, she was caught by some stray Death Eater or their sympathizer. Instead she had been stumbled into by a tipsy Draco Malfoy. He gave an apology to his clumsy moment before giving her a once over.

Maybe hindsight rewrote what had happened but it was after she hid the lingering sign of her wand into her boot did he give her a more through once over before offering to treat her to a drink for his accident.

It was surreal, the thought that Draco Malfoy would take her for a drink much less an apology drink.

Accepting that part of her was too paranoid, she went along with the drink offer. If anything, she would have a silent laugh at how things changed with time.

He seemed to genuinely make an effort to chat her up that night despite her veiled efforts to steer him off. For all he could know, she was a squib or muggle and there in that bar, she gave little away aside from the basics she gave any other muggle she interacted with.

The more they talked the more he pushed for a dinner the next night. Maybe it was his charm, maybe it was the novelty of the situation or maybe she just drank too much that night but she agreed. To add an air of the muggle world, she gave him her mobile number. If anything, it would cement to him, she was not some pureblood and some element of her lived in the muggle world.

Part of her didn't expect him to call her. Part of her pegged him to give up based on the fact that he would actually have to call her.

So sometime midday when she had waited the appropriate amount of time before accepting that she did a good job of driving him off, he called her.

She saw the unknown number and gave a good pause before answering.

His admittance of never having to call a girl was unusually endearing enough that she showed up to dinner with him at a muggle restaurant near school.

By the third date, he knew more about her than just the basics she told others in passing. Of course, by the third date, he had more than realized she was a muggleborn and had yet to make a sneer or disparaging remark to her in that respect.

So, maybe it was more than charm that had her taking him home for the night.

So when she admitted that she didn't know much about him or things Malfoy, she was lying in the truth. She never did really get to know him from Hogwarts and same of his family. All she knew was in passing and in war but that did not make to knowing someone. She was sure part of him didn't believe her but he never pushed on that. Despite some telling of slight details, he never seemed to dig into her past and the potential they knew each other.

He had known she was at Hogwarts at some point in time. Occasionally, she gave away a tell to reveal what year and house she was in but he never asked and she never gave more.

A few dates splattered here and there after and he drew the conclusion that she was a witch who reformed back to the muggle world out of choice.

Maybe it was in the fact that she gave so little that he did the same.

Nothing about the path they followed created a deep meaningful real relationship.

At least not one where you introduced each other to your best mates or took someone home to the parents.

No, her friends and family weren't clueless enough to believe she wasn't seeing someone. They simply assumed what they could. Harry and Ron and anyone magical thought she had met some muggle who she hadn't gotten to telling she was a witch. As for her parents they assumed she was seeing a wizard and was weaning him to all things muggle. Even her flatmate didn't inquire too much into his quirks or her future with him.

So, when her year at the muggle university was over, she hung on the fence. She never asked where they were going and he never pushed for anything.

If anything, as time grew, he went from her bit of fun to her bit of spoiling.

When she started university to be a healer, her life took a turn. She was more often than not stressed and pushed to strive for something more. She had less time for anything but school and that included him along with her family and friends. In some respect, her family and friends thought he had dropped out of her life, permanently or temporarily, she never established.

They didn't have to know him to know that she was simply too busy for a continued relationship.

He knew it.

He had called many a times only to have her not answer or give a time so far off it might have seemed like she was pushing him off. So they moved onto a relationship of whenever possible rather than any given time.

So a few stolen hours here and there made for the need for a few stolen days wherever she had time. The quaint dinners and meetings moved onto getaways of decadence.

She never asked for more from him as it didn't seem fair given the bed of lies and half truths she started with him. She never planned for a future given that she hadn't a plan of giving him the half he didn't ask for. He had known from the start she was half there and he never pushed for more. So with time, they saw each other less and less. As the years grew, and his life outside of her grew, so did hers.

They never spoke of some benchmark in either of their lives where things could change for them, at least not for more. It all walked the path where one day, their real lives would end it all. One day, he would wake and choose work or something else rather than meet her. Just as she saw herself picking something else over him one day and not knowing if it was for the better of worse when that day came.

So, for their time together, she was someone else. Someone who was fine with that life with him flitting in and out like she did.

When she left, she lied to herself that she had taken personal time and the details didn't matter. A bit of pampering from him and some on her own and she mingled the two enough to pretend that what mattered didn't and it would be fine one day.