Epilogue compliant!
Right now, it thunders,
And the sandman despises me,
Enjoy the product!
Oreos
Hermione walked into the pantry and promptly walked out. The oreos were very egregiously missing.
"Draco?" She called into the quiet house.
Her husband strolled into the kitchen, a newspaper in one hand. "Yes, dear?"
"What happened to the oreos?" She asked suspiciously. House elves did not eat oreos. Not even her house elves, who had been trained to stop fearing their master and take care of themselves properly.
"What oreos?" He asked innocently, putting his paper down and kissing her forehead.
"The ones… are those oreo crumbs on your chin?" She grabbed his chin to inspect the offending crumbs before he could pull away.
"Couldn't be," he told her dismissively, wiping his hand across his mouth and effectively removing the evidence.
"Draco!" She admonished.
"What?"
"Those were for the children, and though you may act like a tempestuous child, you aren't one!" She scolded. "Oreos are Rose's favorite, and I wanted to make this trip home special for the children!"
He rolled his eyes. "Love, you can feed them all the cake and cookies and candy you want—sending them into diabetic comas won't placate them."
She huffed. "No, but maybe it would help!" Though the wedding had been over the Christmas holidays, this would be the first time that all three children would be staying at home with their parents. It was making Hermione quite nervous. Visions of screaming, fighting children danced through her head, and her husband was too amused at the thought of squabbling step-children to mitigate her worries. It was definitely going to be an interesting summer.
He laughed and she punched him in the gut. No ribs were bruised, but it was surprisingly painful. "Hey!"
"Hey!" She mimicked angrily before pulling muggle money out of her pocket and slapping it into his hand. "Go to the grocery store and buy a new package of oreos. Get the ones with the special holiday icing. They're blue. The packaging will be exactly the same as the package that you stole."
He sighed. The momentary satisfaction of eating the entire parcel of cookies was not worth his wife's wrath. Plus, the stomach ache only exacerbated the situation, but he figured that asking for a soothing potion would only earn him a glare. Honestly, it was just the children coming home from Hogwarts; it wasn't as bad a panic situation as when Narcissa decided to "grace" them with her presence.
"What if they don't have them?" He asked, partially out of curiosity and partially to annoy her.
"Then I guess you better not come home tonight. Or ever."
He made a face at her, and she stuck her tongue out at him. In the next instant, though, her tongue was down his throat and she stood still, shocked, before the sneaky bastard pulled back away and smiled mischievously.
"I'll be back soon," he called out as he headed toward the front door.
She didn't move, then snapped out of it and repressed her urge to continue the kiss. They'd known each other for over 20 years and dated for 3, and yet he still managed to surprise her. She smiled at the thought.
"You better be back in time to pick them up at the station!" She hollered, remembering herself before the door slammed.
She knew he only did things to annoy her because he liked seeing her flustered. She had other ways of catching his attention.
Draco returned with the oreos, because even he knew that right now, something as simple as oreos could set off his frazzled wife.
He set the grocery bag down beside her in the kitchen as she finished icing the red velvet cake for Scorpius.
"Did you get the oreos?" She asked absently as she carefully eyed the frosting, as if Scorpius would actually analyze the aesthetics of the cake and the rest of their relationship would be determined based on whether or not the cream cheese frosting was evenly distributed over the cake.
"I did come home, didn't I?" He jested before kissing the back of her head, careful not to jostle her; he'd never hear the end of it if he did.
She looked up from the cake and glanced at the bag he was holding before looking at him curiously. "What else did you get?"
He extracted a small white bottle from the opaque plastic bag and held it up for her to see.
"Draco Malfoy, why on earth did you buy midol?"
He grinned cheekily. "Well, love, I thought it might help with the mood swings."
The little bottle was promptly thrown at his head.
Draco and Hermione stood on Platform 9¾, anxiously waiting for the train to arrive. They were relatively lucky; Astoria was out of the country with her latest paramour and wouldn't be there even if she had remembered, and Ron had written her only the night before that he wouldn't be able to get off work as planned. Of course, both ex-spouses would give them hell later, but for now, they only had to contend with pulling a family together. Compared to dealing with the bitch satan spawned, becoming the picture-perfect little wizarding family would be a piece of cake. Red velvet cake.
Hermione squeezed the life out of Draco's hand when the steam from the train became visible on the horizon.
"Hermione," he whimpered. "Hermione, my hand."
She released him, but only a little. She was too excited, too nervous. God, what if they all hated each other? What if they wrote to their other parents, demanded to be picked up immediately? A million different scenarios ran through her head, each equally unpleasant, if not more unpleasant than the last. She almost dreaded the oncoming train bringing her children closer to her.
"What if," she began nervously, but he cut her off quickly.
"Love, everything will be fine."
"I'm sorry, I didn't realize you had such a predilection for divination," she said sarcastically, not because she was in the mood to gibe, but because that was what they did. It was almost routine.
"Merlin, Hermione, they're just children, not serial killers," he laughed nervously. "What's the worst that could happen?"
But Hermione could think of a lot of terrible things that could happen.
She didn't have time to argue her aggression out with him, because it was then that she realized someone was calling for her down the platform.
"Harry!" She squealed and embraced her friend. His wife was very noticeably missing, but she didn't ask questions. She didn't have to; she'd lost quite a few friends due to the divorce, and she would have been stupid to expect Ginny to "pick" her over Ginny's own brother. In fact, only immediate family had been invited to the wedding so Hermione didn't have to come to terms with the fact that she had very few friends who supported the match. As in, none.
"Hermione!" He exclaimed. However, once the excitement of reuniting passed, it was rather awkward for both of them. They hadn't really spoken since she had divorced his best friend. "Hello, Draco," he said politely out of an attempt to fill the uncomfortable silence.
"Harry," Draco said and nodded.
The awkward silence did not resume for the simple reason that Ginny had stalked over and grabbed Harry by his tie before leading him away angrily. Hermione surmised that she was not quite forgiven yet.
She and Draco watched as the other couple argued and gesticulated wildly, causing quite a scene. Though the words did not carry through the din of the train station, Hermione could imagine that it was something along the lines of…
"Why were you talking to that whore? She's dead to us!"
"She was my friend!"
"Before she broke my brother's heart! Your best friend, you arsehole! Don't fraternize with the enemy!"
Yes, Hermione could imagine it was going quite well. Her husband pulled her in for a quick hug and whispered reassurances into her ear.
"Blue canary," she told him suddenly.
"What?" he looked confused, but to his credit, did not look at her like she was crazy as Ron always had.
"That's our code word," she clarified. "If I'm ever being an overbearing shrew and attempting to cut you off from your friends unreasonably, just yell "blue canary" and I'll attempt to stop being a bitch."
A smile twitched at the corner of his mouth. "Attempt, huh?"
She smiled sheepishly in return. "Well, I may just burst out sobbing, depending on the context, given that you will, essentially, be calling me a complete bitch."
"You? Never," he said teasingly. She moved to whack him upside the head, but he was too quick for her, and laced her fingers with his to jerk her closer to him so he could press a quick kiss on her lips.
"I love you," she said suddenly and sincerely.
"I love you too," he replied without hesitation before kissing her again, this time tenderly.
Their antics were sadly interrupted, though, by the whistle announcing the approaching train.
They continued to hold hands nervously as the train came into view. Despite his attempts to calm her with a calculated touch to the small of her back or reassuring word, she knew he was worried too; their family would be together for the first time today, and maybe the last, if they all killed each other.
Though they both hoped desperately it wouldn't come to that.
By the time the train pulled into the station, their knuckles were white.
They watched the stream of children pilling off the train, their eyes searching everywhere at once.
"Scorpius!" Draco called suddenly, and he directed Hermione's attention to their far left and the little blonde boy who was dragging enough trunks for a small army. Even from a distance, she could tell that he had grown and his clothes no longer fit right. She made a quick mental note to take him shopping.
Draco squeezed her hand comfortingly before rushing to greet his son. Hermione only stood there alone for a few moments more before spotting Hugo to her right. He looked like he was drowning in his luggage as well, and she went to help him.
By the time she had properly nearly suffocated her son and taken him to the meeting spot, Draco, Scorpius and Rose were already waiting for them. Hermione gave Rose her own hug of death before hugging Scorpius as well. His hug was not as bone-crushing, but was still a step above the handshake he had attempted to initiate.
"Well, we're all here," Draco announced cheerily, easily slipping into the happy father role. "Everyone ready to go home?"
The three children looked at him with similar looks of nonchalance and horror. It was almost as if they had been told they were all going to be flogged by pygmy puffs.
Dinner had been surprisingly quiet. It was Terrible Situation #16 in Hermione's head: the children refuse to speak because they hate us for what we've done and we have psychologically scarred them for life by forcing the marriage upon them.
There was a bit of talking, though, in the form of "how's school?" "fine". That had been the highlight of the conversation for the evening.
"So… um…" Hermione began, anxious to fill the silence, but overly selective in topics; she couldn't bore them with details about her job and didn't want to talk about the honeymoon because that would be gross and only further shove the relationship in their faces. Good lord, why hadn't they just waited to get married? The kids should have had more time to adjust. Like, maybe when they had their own kids to worry about and couldn't be arsed about their parents any longer.
Rose suddenly stopped bothering to play with her food absently and dropped her fork with a loud clang. "Are you pregnant?" She asked suddenly, her face flushed with embarrassment.
The room resonated with the sounds of everyone else's forks dropping to their plates as well. It couldn't have been scripted more comically, but no one was laughing. "What? No!" Hermione answered quickly, more embarrassed than her daughter, though she blushed less. "Rose!"
"So you aren't pregnant now, and you weren't pregnant when you married my dad," Scorpius asked quickly.
"No!" Draco answered, a bit embarrassed as well but doing the best job at concealing it. "It was not a shot-gun wedding! Merlin, Scorpius!"
"And you're not planning to get pregnant, right?" Rose asked.
"No!" Hermione exclaimed, then blushed. "Well. Maybe. Someday. But probably not."
Draco was equally shaken. "Yes, probably not."
"You don't even know?" Scorpius yelled. "Aren't you supposed to discuss things like this before you get married? I mean, for Merlin's sake, what if you wanted ten kids and she was done unnaturally shoving things out of unspeakable orifices?"
"Do you have to be so crude!" Rose chastised as she grimaced. That was not a pleasant image.
"Um, I suppose we would discuss it and come to a logical decision. But that's not an issue because we aren't having children," Hermione answered for her husband.
"We aren't?" Draco asked, perplexed. Hadn't that conclusion been less definite moments before?
"Aren't we?" Hermione retorted.
"What?" His face contorted with confusion.
"Aren't we not having children?" She clarified.
"Don't use double negatives! They're confusing!" He exclaimed. "And I don't know, nothing's definite. Do you want to have more children?"
And then the reality of their dinner table talk hit her. "God, Draco, we should not be having this conversation in front of our children!"
"Merlin, please don't!" Scorpius interjected.
Draco's temper got the better of him "You need to-"Draco began, before being cut off by his wife.
"Who wants dessert?" She asked loudly, interrupting what would have led to a rousing and terrifying father-son screaming match.
She dashed into the kitchen and returned, precariously balancing a piece of cake, a bowl of ice cream, and a tray of oreos in her hands. She looked at the nearly empty dining room, though, and dropped the dishes onto the table with a clatter.
"Where did everyone go?" She bewilderedly asked the only remaining person, Hugo.
He shrugged his shoulders and reached for the ice cream, which his mother pushed across the table to him.
"What happened?" She asked. She couldn't hear screaming, so that was a good sign, right?
Hugo answered his mother only after extracting the spoon from his mouth. "Draco pulled Rose and Scorpius into the other room. He said he wanted to talk," he paused as if deep in thought. "Do I have to call him dad?" He asked.
Once again, Hermione was caught off-guard. "Only if you want to," she told him as she brushed his bangs from his eyes. "Even though I love him, we both know and respect that Ron is your father, and we aren't trying to take you away from him or make you chose between us. Draco wants to be part of your life, though, and will be there for you whenever you need him," that only partially sounded like it was taught from a book, Hermione decided with satisfaction. To her credit, she had done some research on raising children in combined families. Just not as much as she should have, apparently.
"Okay." He sounded happy enough. Sometimes she wondered where his childlike innocence came from. The spoon went back in his mouth, and after another swallow of ice cream, he asked her another question. "Mum, what's an unspeakable orifice?"
Draco returned with the other children right after Hugo had finished his ice cream. She had already put the cake and oreos away and washed Hugo's empty ice cream bowl after clearing the dinner dishes. The pair had just been sitting in the kitchen, conversing more easily, when the other three decided to reappear. No one looked maimed or traumatized, which Hermione took as a good sign.
She scrutinized her husband, trying to decipher exactly what he was up to. It just wouldn't do, though, to question him in front of the children; they were supposed to appear as a unified parental front, not a mess of squabbling adults. He studiously ignored her glare.
"So, who wants a tour of the house?" He asked.
The children all looked mildly enthusiastic, which he took as a 'yes'.
They went through the rooms of the house methodically. Draco and Hermione had been living there since the wedding, but the children had been with their other parents for the holidays, and it had been a miracle enough that Draco and Hermione could have them at the wedding.
The house was smaller than Draco's old mansion, but larger than the cottage she had shared with Ron. It had taken months to finally find the house, after numerous fights and multiple accusations that the other was being too particular. They had decided on their new home almost before setting foot in it, just based on what the realtor said.
No room went to waste. Each child had their own room, with Hugo's closest to his parents', and there was a guestroom, a study for Draco, and the library Hermione had always dreamed of, as well as a field in the back large enough to accommodate quidditch. It was perfect for them, they had decided.
Watching the children appraise the house made them less sure. Hermione was overcome by a sudden fear that the stairs were much too steep and that someone would fall down them and break their neck. Draco was convinced that the children would abuse the hidden safe room, and that it was not secure enough for an emergency.
They showed the children their room and told them that they could decorate however they wanted.
"Subject to our approval," Draco added quickly, catching Scorpius' sly smile.
The tour complete, they'd all gone outside to play quidditch and read until the sun sank beneath the horizon, at which point Hermione had declared it time for baths and then bed.
Three hours later, though, she was still awake, and keeping her husband up with her tossing and turning.
"'Mione, I love you, but if you don't stop tossing and turning and kicking me in the kidney, I will shove a sleeping drought down your throat," he grumbled.
"Sorry," she whispered. She sighed and gave up on sleep. "I'm going to get a glass of water," she told him as she got out of bed.
But she didn't. Instead, she went to Hugo's room. He, for one, was sound asleep. She kissed his forehead and pulled the sheet up from his feet, tucking him in. He may be going into his second year of Hogwarts, but he would never be too old for his mother's love. Especially if he were unconscious and thus unable to protest.
Scorpius was next, as his room was right next to Hugo's and the boys shared the jack-and-jill bathroom. Except Scorpius was not in his room. Hermione tried not to panic. She knew there were plenty of logical explanations. He could have fallen asleep reading in the library. He could have gone flying. He could have been kidnapped by his insane mother.
She rushed across the hall to Rose's room, only to find that her daughter was also missing.
Oh dear lord.
Where would they have gone? She fought the urge to panic and quickly searched the rest of the room upstairs. They were all irritatingly silent. She told herself she was being ridiculous as she sprinted down the hall to the front staircase. She paused at her bedroom door, wondering if she should wake her husband, but then decided against it; she was only overreacting, and she would make him overreact with her, and then when he realized that they were both overreacting, she would never hear the end of it. So she left him snoring.
She searched the first floor, beginning with the library and even searching the coat closet for clues. It wasn't until she got to the kitchen that she let herself breathe; Rose and Scorpius were on the kitchen floor, eating oreos and cake.
"Oh thank god!" She exclaimed when she saw them.
"Mum!" Rose flinched. "What are you doing up?" She asked nervously.
"Me! What about you? And you? Do you know what time it is?"She screeched.
"About midnight, ma'am," Scorpius supplied politely.
Ma'am. "Scorpius, how much did your father pay you to be nice?"
The pale boy blanched to an ill shade of white. "How did you know?" He asked, his eyes wide.
"I know your father," she replied simply as she slid down the wall to sit beside them on the floor. "I'm guessing that he told the two of you to be nice when we were at the train station, and then after the pregnancy fiasco at dinner, he took you to the other room to scold and bribe you. Is that about right?" They nodded, looking scared. "Oh, don't worry, I'm not angry with either of you," she reassured them.
They visibly relaxed. "But really, how much?" She asked seriously.
Scorpius turned slightly pink. Hermione was amused; according to her dear husband, Malfoys did not blush. "He promised he'd get us tickets to the quidditch finals," Scorpius admitted.
"How many?" She inquired.
"One for each of us," Rose told her mother sheepishly.
Hermione smiled devilishly. Screw the "united parental front"- getting through the summer and actually being family-like was more important that being effective disciplinarians. "I'll give you two each so you can bring another friend if you continue to bother your father."
"Mum!"
"I'll protect you from his wrath, of course," Hermione added hastily.
"Why?" Scorpius asked curiously.
"Because, dear, I thoroughly enjoy annoying your father. It keeps me young."
If her children had only been awkward to annoy her on purpose and they actually got along quite well, maybe there was hope for the weird little family after all. Especially if she managed to distract them with silly mind games they could all laugh about. After all, it was much better to have fake drama than real drama.
Yes, it would be a good summer.
"Mum, you're a little bit twisted," Rose said.
Hermione rolled her eyes, a gesture she'd acquired from her husband. "Shut up, dear, and eat your oreos."
By the way, don't assume that events are consistent throughout these pieces, because they aren't. For example, Ron might be flaming gay in one story, and a womanizing man-whore in the next. Just so you aren't baffled. But names are staying the same, and enough context should be given that everything makes sense. If not, just whack me in the head with a book. Hogwarts: A History, preferably.
I told myself I was going to bed an hour ago. You can see how well that went. But this will be the last update in a little while because I have convention and ACT this weekend!
I like reviews more than holiday oreos!