Hey EVERYONE!

I'm back from my hiatus..well, not really! This is a revamp of TeagieDog's Story, uh, I think it was called the Proposal. Well, me and my AMAZING beta re-wrote it, well, she did most of the work!, and it is not really awesome!

So here it is...

Publicly In Love
By SlytherinGurrl & 23Nelly

A few hours earlier…

Hermione and Draco were cuddling on the couch watching one of Hermione favorite movies, Pretty Woman. How Draco got suckered into it he'll never know, but he didn't care. Because tonight was her night. The Night. He wanted to make sure everything was going to be perfect because tonight was the night he was going to-

"Oh, shit! Look at the time. Draco, why didn't you remind me what time it was?" She moved away from his embrace, but was quickly pulled down in his lap.

"It's 6:30, babe." He smirked at her.

"I meant, why didn't you remind me earlier, you ferret." She playfully hit him on the shoulder.

"Oh ferret now is it?" He quirked an eyebrow at her and soon their living room was filled with both their laughter as he tickled her sides.

"Stop, stop stop!" Hermione shouted in between her giggles and laughter. When he finally stopped he was holding himself above her. "I have to get ready for Harry and Ginny's engagement party Dray."

"Ughh!" Draco groaned and he dropped his head on her chest. "I don't want you to go." He mumbled into her embrace.

"Well I have to go." She stoked his hair. "It's their engagement party and they're my best friends." He lifted his body up so his face was hovering over hers.

"How long will you be gone?" He asked nipping at her lips as she wrapped her arms around his shoulders and neck.

"Not too long, just a couple of hours. Maybe I can leave an hour or two early." She replied kissing him back. His hands started to creep under her shirt until she pulled away and stopped him.

"There will be none of that, mister. Now, get up so I can get ready." He didn't budge.

She tried again, "The quicker I leave the quicker I can come back and finish what we were doing?" She whispered seductively.

"Fine." He grumbled as he moved off her. Draco grabbed the remote and began to flip through the T.V. channels as Hermione made her way to their bedroom to get dressed. As soon as her heard the door close, he started cleaning up their flat with of flick of his wand and twist of his wrist.

Since Hermione demanded no house elves what-so-ever, Draco had resorted to cleaning with his wand in hiding because she preferred doing it the old fashion way by hand.

After twenty minutes of hard work, he set up floating candles and rose petals to set the mood for when they got back from the party. When he heard Hermione's footsteps down the hall, he quickly used a concealment charm to hide all his decorations. He quickly jumped over the back of the couch, and pretended to be half asleep watching a muggle basketball game.

"Draco, I'm leaving." Hermione said walking to the door. Draco quickly caught her arm as she passed the couch on the way to the door. As he stood up, he took in her appearance and licked his lips.

She was wearing a ruby red cocktail dress that shimmered like water. Her hair was pulled to the side and held together by a rose clip. Hermione's make-up was subtle, with only mascara and cherry red lip gloss. Her outfit was accented with her gold bangles, given to her by Parvati as a birthday gift last year and 18 karat gold heart studs with diamonds that Draco had given her.

"You look, well, amazing 'Mione." He gave her a slow lingering kiss as he opened the door for her. "Bye, babe." She waved and walked out the front door, apparating to Harry and Ginny's place.

After she was gone Draco ran to make sure the ring he had gotten three days ago, was still where he hid it. A year of dating secretly dating, he was going to announce them publicly. By proposing.

"Whew, okay it's there." He let out a breath he was holding and he picked up the ring. It was a 24 karat diamond set in a gold band that was molded into a body of a snake. On the inside of the band it said, Always & Forever, You'll Have My Heart. He slipped it into his black dress pant pocket, he was going to wear tonight and made his way to the bathroom to get ready.

At the party…

Hermione was having fun. She had congratulated the happy couple and had toasted to them and gave them their engagement gift. She saw some of her old classmates, which included Dean and Luna, Neville and Cho. Of course the whole Weasley clan was present and even some of the old Order members as well also in attendance. They were all reminiscing about the days back at Hogwarts and the fun they had.

The only down side was when the festive party music changed to slow ballads, a drunken Ron had chosen to start hitting on her. He kept flirting with her even after she declined him politely and even reminding him that he was there with his current girlfriend, Lavender.

He just didn't understand; she did not want him. Of course that was because she had Draco but no one knew that. Ginny had suspected Hermione had someone in her life that she and her friends wouldn't approve of, but she couldn't put a finger on who it could be. Harry, of course, stayed out of it. He knew Hermione had been a lot happier even since she and Ron broke up after they went back to Hogwarts to finish their 7th year but he didn't dare ask why. Ron on the other hand…was being Ron.

"Hey 'Mione, how are you cutie?" Ron asked, draping an arm around her shoulders. Hermione could see that on the other side of the room, a fuming Lavender was glaring daggers at Hermione as she was talking to Padma.

"Ron, please stop. You have a girlfriend. If you can't refrain from touching me, then please stay away from me.", she said pushing his arm off of her. Hermione had been dealing with this for hours. She couldn't wait until the party was over so she could go back to Draco. Little did she know he would be arriving very soon.

As soon as she escaped Ron's clutches, she made her way to the refreshment table and grabbed some punch. Soon the party got quiet suddenly. Hermione turned around to see the crowd part for Draco. To say she was shocked was an understatement. He walked right up to Hermione and traced her cheek with his finger. She gave him a small smile and tried to pull him away from the obvious, staring eyes.

"Draco what are you doing here?" She whispered.

"Something I should have done a long time ago. Hermione will-"

"What are you doing here, Malfoy?" Ron asked stepping to Draco.

"I came to ask your beautiful ex an important question." Draco said slyly, pushing Ron aside. Everyone gasped as he bent to his knee and pulled out a red velvet box out of his pocket. He opened it to reveal a beautiful ring. "Hermione Jean Granger, I want to ask you in front of all your friends, and surrogate family, will you give me the honor of marrying you?" Hermione was to speechless and was not able to answer Draco. The rest of the crowd that saw it all happening was also speechless. Of course, someone had to ruin the moment.

"Is this a joke Malfoy? What are you even doing here?" Ron stepped in front of Hermione, asking questions. Hermione pushed Ron out of the way and pulled Draco up and kissed him passionately. As she pulled back, she kept whispering "Yes."

"Hermione, are you part of this joke? Seriously, you know this is the ferret right?" Ron asked, still confused about the situation going on in front of his own eyes.

"No, Ron, me and Draco have been dating for just over a year." She replied, turning to the audience watching them intently.

"I knew it!" Ginny shouted fist pumping in the air. "Harry and I had a bet, I knew it was Malfoy, Harry thought it was some older Slytherin who graduated before us." Hermione and Draco laughed at Ginny's outburst and kissed again.

"And now we're engaged." Draco picked her up and kissed her yet again, walking them to the door and the people in the room applauded.

"Sorry to rain on your parade tonight, Potter but I thought Hermione would appreciate me declaring my love around the people she cares about the most." He smirked. Harry nodded and raised a glass to the newly engaged couple as they walked out of the house.

"I love you." Hermione murmured against his lips.

"Always and Forever, babe." He replied back, kissing her on the doorstep of Harry Potter's home.

I hope you enjoyed that. Yet AGAIN, I want to thank my amazing beta, 23Nelly for putting in a Lot of work to write this! Thanks, Nelly! LOVE YA!

Thanks TeagieDog for also letting us edit your story!

SEE YOU ALL NEXT TIME!