Chapter 4 – An Old "Friend"
Disclaimer: They are not mine, not mine, la la la la la….
The next day, Hermione dragged herself out of bed at the usual time – six in the morning. As she stepped out into the kitchen to prepare breakfast, she was greeted by the faint smell of pizza, which she and Oscar had made for the previous night's dinner. She flicked the light switch and started to prepare breakfast.
As usual, Oscar came into the kitchen to investigate the source of the smells that had lured him out of bed a few minutes after seven. He rubbed his eyes as he stood in the doorway, looking adorable in his slightly too big flannel pajamas. "Pancakes?" he asked hopefully.
"Well, good morning to you too, Oscar. Are your manners still asleep?"
"Good morning, mummy. I love you! But I would love you more if you were making pancakes," he quietly added, trying to peek around her to the stovetop.
Hermione laughed. "Fine, you win, its pancakes," she said.
After eating they finished their morning chores quickly, and at eight Hermione took Oscar downstairs to wait for the school bus. On the sidewalk, Oscar ran to greet the familiar group of children, who immediately busied themselves with some muggle trading cards. Off at the side, the other mothers of the building laughed and chatted quietly among themselves, bundled in their expensive fur coats. They smiled and nodded at Hermione, who smiled back, but made no attempt to join their conversation. She learnt long ago that as a young unmarried mother, she would not be accepted into all social situations, muggle or otherwise.
The school bus arrived shortly, and Hermione waved to Oscar as he boarded the bus. She quickly turned and headed back up to the apartment. She had left her warmest coat, her dragon hide jacket, upstairs so as not to attract attention, and the thin wool jumper didn't keep her nearly as warm. It was her day off, so she didn't have to go into the office, but she planned to do some work anyway to make up for the disorganized state in which she left the office yesterday.
The bank must have other plans, however, for when she got back to her apartment a large black owl wearing a yellow scarf with the bank's insignia was seated on her windowsill. With a small sigh of disappointment, she lifted the window and took the parchment from the owl. She untied the message and read:
Ms. Granger –
I'm sorry to bother you on your day off but this morning the ministry sent word of urgent business. They want to borrow some of the bank's treasure hunters for some expedition. I've set up a meeting for you at their request with Mr. Potter and Mr. Weasley at nine thirty today in their office at the ministry. – Jessica
Hermione tossed the parchment down with a huff of annoyance, her light brown eyes flashing with anger at the thought of delaying her own work even more than it already had been for some stupid ministry business. The ministry employed hundreds of talented wizards; why did they need to borrow the bank's treasure hunters? If they had wanted to work for the ministry, they would have in the first place, wouldn't they? She looked at the owl, which was waiting patiently for an answer. She called for her quill and hurriedly scribbled on the back of the parchment:
Fine, but tell the ministry I am NOT happy about them filching our employees. Call Harry and Ron to confirm the appointment.
She fastened the parchment back onto the owl and stepped back as it disappeared from her window with powerful flaps of its wings. She sighed as she watched it turn to a tiny dot in the sky. There went her quiet day of work.
She grabbed some forest green robes and slipped them over her black jeans and cashmere camel sweater before apparating to her office. Frantically, she searched through her files and somehow managed to find every necessary paper before the nine-thirty deadline.
"Bye, Jessica," Hermione called to her secretary through an armload of papers as she closed her office door behind her. Not trusting her flustered state of mind, she decided to travel through the floo network in case she somehow appeared in the middle of Siberia or something.
She smiled and nodded to the calls of "Good morning, Ms. Ganger," as she wove her way through the maze of desks on the way to the office fireplace. Almost there, almost there…if only the papers would just stay still for one more minute…
"Ms. Granger!"
Hermione gasped and stared in dismay as all her carefully organized papers tumbled to the floor. Dammit! Oh no, Hermione, you couldn't have done it the easy way, she thought angrily to herself. You couldn't take the two seconds to reach for a folder to put the papers in. THAT would have been too hard. You just HAD to rush to see Ron, whom you only saw yesterday! She turned to see who was the source of the noise.
"Simon," she said in frustration as she recognized the dirty blond hair and the hazel eyes standing a couple inches above her own. "Why couldn't you just tap me on the shoulder nicely?"
"I'm sorry Ms. Granger," he said, eyes twinkling with excitement as always, "but I really wanted to catch you before you left the office. I mean, since its your day off and all, I wasn't sure if you would be coming back to the office later and there was something I really wanted to talk to you about. Its very important." He stopped and took a deep breath.
Hermione internally sighed. With Simon, there was only one thing he ever wanted to talk about – when he would be put on the "big" project. Fresh out of Hogwarts, he believed he had the talent to topple Bill Weasley from his pedestal of highest-earning treasure hunter. Though he was miles ahead of all this year's new recruits, and even ahead of some of the older employees, Hermione still felt he needed some training before she sent him on the big expeditions with hunters like Bill.
"Simon, can't this wait until after my day off?" she implored as she bent to pick up her papers. "I mean, it's my day off and everything and I had TONS of work to do, then the stupid ministry called, trying to bog me down with all of their work as well… I just really don't have time now," she finished lamely as she gathered the last paper from the floor and straightened.
"Oh, um…sure," said Simon. "I'm sorry, you're right, I shouldn't be bothering you on your day off. I'll talk to you Wednesday, okay?"
Hermione smiled with relief. "Yes. Wednesday would be great. Thank you!" she turned and practically ran to the fireplace before someone else could accost her, her fingers clenching her papers with an iron grip.
She reached the far wall of the office building without any more interruptions. Luckily, since it was still early in the morning, there were no lines in front of the five stone fireplaces used for going out. She ran to the nearest one, and within seconds had appeared at the auroras wing at the Ministry of Magic.
She smiled as pictures of past great auroras greeted her, hanging on the walls of the familiar passage to Harry and Ron's office. She reached the cream door towards the end of the hall and pushed it open.
Harry and Ron's heads snapped up at the sound of the door, looking to her as they were floating amidst a sea of parchment, books, maps, and hundreds of magical gidgets. "God," she said, taking in the full extent of the clutter. "What have you two been doing? Spring cleaning in winter?" Harry and Ron looked around.
"It's not that bad, Hermione," Ron said. "We're just working on a big project right now."
Hermoine walked towards the desk and pushed a pile of sneakoscopes off to the side, clearing a small place for her papers. She put them down and turned to Harry. "How have you been, Harry?" she asked. She walked towards him and gave him a hug. "I haven't seen you since we all had dinner at The Burrow two months ago!"
He hugged her back. "I know, and I'm sorry that we haven't seen each other more, but you know – when there's work to be done…"
"Yeah, I know," she said straightening. "When there's work to be done everyone else bolts off and leaves you stuck with it." She never commented on Harry's ideas that Voldemort's successor was poised to take control in the near future because, quite frankly, she didn't know what to think. On one hand, the death eaters certainly wouldn't just lie down and die quietly now that their leader was gone, but they had always seemed so dependent on Voldemort. Now that he was gone, after being their master for twenty years, she couldn't help but think they might be too disorganized to do anything so quickly. "So, what exactly does this mission of yours involve?"
"Well, to make a long story short," Ron began, "Harry found this town in Finland where there is possible Death Eater activity. We want to send a team up there to check things out, but the problem is we don't have enough people with the skills necessary. So, we need to borrow some of your treasure hunters. The best. We need people who are resourceful, quiet, quick on their feet, and above all – people you can trust."
"Right," said Harry, nodding in agreement. "The last thing we need is for one of them to go running off to the Death Eaters with news of our plans."
Hermione thought a moment. "Okay," she said. "I'll give you who I can spare. On one condition – they have to agree to go. I'm not sending anyone in my department to fight a battle that's not their problem unless they want to."
Ron shrugged. "Fair enough."
After spending hours buried in scraps of parchments and being barraged by constant streams of owls, the three had finally pulled together an acceptable list of people to go on the mission to Finland. "Are you going back to your office, Hermione?" Harry asked as she stood and started shifting through piles for her papers.
"No," she answered. "I'm going back home to see if I can get some work done before tomorrow." She thought of Simon back at the office, and how angry he would be when he heard about the mission and how he hadn't been picked to go. Maybe she should take tomorrow off, or better yet seal herself inside her office.
"I'll help you take this stuff back," Ron offered, picking up half of her things. "Bye, Harry," he called as they headed to the fireplace.
"Yeah, bye" he called back. "See you in five hours." His words only barely reached their ears as they were swept up through the fireplace.
"Thanks for helping us, by the way," Ron said as they arrived in Hermione's living room. She dropped her stuff on the white sofa messy pile. He did the same.
"That's okay," she said with a tired sigh, running her hands through her hair. "If it was anyone at the ministry besides you and Harry, I would have told you to go to hell. But I don't mind helping out friends."
"Poor Hermione," Ron said, reaching out to massage her aching shoulders. "Harry and I didn't mean to make more work for you." He leant forward and placed a gentle kiss on the side of her neck.
She smiled. "Harry'll be waiting for you," she murmured.
"No he won't."
She turned her head to kiss him. She loved the way his mouth felt on hers, so soft and warm…. she lost herself in his kiss and suddenly she found herself not in her living room, but in her bedroom, lying on her bed next to Ron, their robes on a pile on the floor. She pulled away from him and looked down at her muggle clothes and his. How did she get here like this? "How do you always do that to me?" she asked.
Ron smiled. "I'm magical."
Hermione laughed as Ron bent his head down for another kiss. She didn't object as she felt his hand creeping up her body underneath her sweater. Oscar wouldn't be home for hours. She moaned as she felt his hand reach her breast and arched her back, pushing herself into his hand. Lifting her arms, she started to tug at the black t-shirt he was wearing, trying to pull it over his head. He groaned into her mouth before quickly pulling away from her. Before she could protest, he had pulled his shirt over his head and tossed it onto the floor with their robes. "It's been too long," he said as he started to pull at her sweater.
"I know," she whispered breathlessly as she started to undo his belt buckle. Suddenly, from somewhere in the room, came a voice that was like a bucket of ice-cold water tossed over both of them.
"I hate to interrupt you, Weasley," the familiar voice said, "as this is probably the closest you've come to getting laid in months. I have some fairly important matters to discuss with your girlfriend, however."
Ron and Hermione sprang apart. In two seconds, Ron had his wand out and aimed at the intruder, keeping the defenseless Hermione behind him with one arm.
"Malfoy," he spat as he recognized the black-clad blond wizard in front of them. "What the fuck do you want?"
Malfoy raised his eyebrows slightly as a small, genuine smile touched his lips. "Oscar," he said simply.
A/N – Yes, I have a thing for cliffhangers, I know! But I promise the next update will not take anything as long as this one. I already have everything planned out in my head so it's just a matter of finding the time to type it!
I know this entry is going to make a lot of people think Malfoy is the father but – I haven't actually said that, have I? *evil cackle* I promise everything will be revealed in the next chapter, however!! And it's not too far away…..
**Sykik
Disclaimer: They are not mine, not mine, la la la la la….
The next day, Hermione dragged herself out of bed at the usual time – six in the morning. As she stepped out into the kitchen to prepare breakfast, she was greeted by the faint smell of pizza, which she and Oscar had made for the previous night's dinner. She flicked the light switch and started to prepare breakfast.
As usual, Oscar came into the kitchen to investigate the source of the smells that had lured him out of bed a few minutes after seven. He rubbed his eyes as he stood in the doorway, looking adorable in his slightly too big flannel pajamas. "Pancakes?" he asked hopefully.
"Well, good morning to you too, Oscar. Are your manners still asleep?"
"Good morning, mummy. I love you! But I would love you more if you were making pancakes," he quietly added, trying to peek around her to the stovetop.
Hermione laughed. "Fine, you win, its pancakes," she said.
After eating they finished their morning chores quickly, and at eight Hermione took Oscar downstairs to wait for the school bus. On the sidewalk, Oscar ran to greet the familiar group of children, who immediately busied themselves with some muggle trading cards. Off at the side, the other mothers of the building laughed and chatted quietly among themselves, bundled in their expensive fur coats. They smiled and nodded at Hermione, who smiled back, but made no attempt to join their conversation. She learnt long ago that as a young unmarried mother, she would not be accepted into all social situations, muggle or otherwise.
The school bus arrived shortly, and Hermione waved to Oscar as he boarded the bus. She quickly turned and headed back up to the apartment. She had left her warmest coat, her dragon hide jacket, upstairs so as not to attract attention, and the thin wool jumper didn't keep her nearly as warm. It was her day off, so she didn't have to go into the office, but she planned to do some work anyway to make up for the disorganized state in which she left the office yesterday.
The bank must have other plans, however, for when she got back to her apartment a large black owl wearing a yellow scarf with the bank's insignia was seated on her windowsill. With a small sigh of disappointment, she lifted the window and took the parchment from the owl. She untied the message and read:
Ms. Granger –
I'm sorry to bother you on your day off but this morning the ministry sent word of urgent business. They want to borrow some of the bank's treasure hunters for some expedition. I've set up a meeting for you at their request with Mr. Potter and Mr. Weasley at nine thirty today in their office at the ministry. – Jessica
Hermione tossed the parchment down with a huff of annoyance, her light brown eyes flashing with anger at the thought of delaying her own work even more than it already had been for some stupid ministry business. The ministry employed hundreds of talented wizards; why did they need to borrow the bank's treasure hunters? If they had wanted to work for the ministry, they would have in the first place, wouldn't they? She looked at the owl, which was waiting patiently for an answer. She called for her quill and hurriedly scribbled on the back of the parchment:
Fine, but tell the ministry I am NOT happy about them filching our employees. Call Harry and Ron to confirm the appointment.
She fastened the parchment back onto the owl and stepped back as it disappeared from her window with powerful flaps of its wings. She sighed as she watched it turn to a tiny dot in the sky. There went her quiet day of work.
She grabbed some forest green robes and slipped them over her black jeans and cashmere camel sweater before apparating to her office. Frantically, she searched through her files and somehow managed to find every necessary paper before the nine-thirty deadline.
"Bye, Jessica," Hermione called to her secretary through an armload of papers as she closed her office door behind her. Not trusting her flustered state of mind, she decided to travel through the floo network in case she somehow appeared in the middle of Siberia or something.
She smiled and nodded to the calls of "Good morning, Ms. Ganger," as she wove her way through the maze of desks on the way to the office fireplace. Almost there, almost there…if only the papers would just stay still for one more minute…
"Ms. Granger!"
Hermione gasped and stared in dismay as all her carefully organized papers tumbled to the floor. Dammit! Oh no, Hermione, you couldn't have done it the easy way, she thought angrily to herself. You couldn't take the two seconds to reach for a folder to put the papers in. THAT would have been too hard. You just HAD to rush to see Ron, whom you only saw yesterday! She turned to see who was the source of the noise.
"Simon," she said in frustration as she recognized the dirty blond hair and the hazel eyes standing a couple inches above her own. "Why couldn't you just tap me on the shoulder nicely?"
"I'm sorry Ms. Granger," he said, eyes twinkling with excitement as always, "but I really wanted to catch you before you left the office. I mean, since its your day off and all, I wasn't sure if you would be coming back to the office later and there was something I really wanted to talk to you about. Its very important." He stopped and took a deep breath.
Hermione internally sighed. With Simon, there was only one thing he ever wanted to talk about – when he would be put on the "big" project. Fresh out of Hogwarts, he believed he had the talent to topple Bill Weasley from his pedestal of highest-earning treasure hunter. Though he was miles ahead of all this year's new recruits, and even ahead of some of the older employees, Hermione still felt he needed some training before she sent him on the big expeditions with hunters like Bill.
"Simon, can't this wait until after my day off?" she implored as she bent to pick up her papers. "I mean, it's my day off and everything and I had TONS of work to do, then the stupid ministry called, trying to bog me down with all of their work as well… I just really don't have time now," she finished lamely as she gathered the last paper from the floor and straightened.
"Oh, um…sure," said Simon. "I'm sorry, you're right, I shouldn't be bothering you on your day off. I'll talk to you Wednesday, okay?"
Hermione smiled with relief. "Yes. Wednesday would be great. Thank you!" she turned and practically ran to the fireplace before someone else could accost her, her fingers clenching her papers with an iron grip.
She reached the far wall of the office building without any more interruptions. Luckily, since it was still early in the morning, there were no lines in front of the five stone fireplaces used for going out. She ran to the nearest one, and within seconds had appeared at the auroras wing at the Ministry of Magic.
She smiled as pictures of past great auroras greeted her, hanging on the walls of the familiar passage to Harry and Ron's office. She reached the cream door towards the end of the hall and pushed it open.
Harry and Ron's heads snapped up at the sound of the door, looking to her as they were floating amidst a sea of parchment, books, maps, and hundreds of magical gidgets. "God," she said, taking in the full extent of the clutter. "What have you two been doing? Spring cleaning in winter?" Harry and Ron looked around.
"It's not that bad, Hermione," Ron said. "We're just working on a big project right now."
Hermoine walked towards the desk and pushed a pile of sneakoscopes off to the side, clearing a small place for her papers. She put them down and turned to Harry. "How have you been, Harry?" she asked. She walked towards him and gave him a hug. "I haven't seen you since we all had dinner at The Burrow two months ago!"
He hugged her back. "I know, and I'm sorry that we haven't seen each other more, but you know – when there's work to be done…"
"Yeah, I know," she said straightening. "When there's work to be done everyone else bolts off and leaves you stuck with it." She never commented on Harry's ideas that Voldemort's successor was poised to take control in the near future because, quite frankly, she didn't know what to think. On one hand, the death eaters certainly wouldn't just lie down and die quietly now that their leader was gone, but they had always seemed so dependent on Voldemort. Now that he was gone, after being their master for twenty years, she couldn't help but think they might be too disorganized to do anything so quickly. "So, what exactly does this mission of yours involve?"
"Well, to make a long story short," Ron began, "Harry found this town in Finland where there is possible Death Eater activity. We want to send a team up there to check things out, but the problem is we don't have enough people with the skills necessary. So, we need to borrow some of your treasure hunters. The best. We need people who are resourceful, quiet, quick on their feet, and above all – people you can trust."
"Right," said Harry, nodding in agreement. "The last thing we need is for one of them to go running off to the Death Eaters with news of our plans."
Hermione thought a moment. "Okay," she said. "I'll give you who I can spare. On one condition – they have to agree to go. I'm not sending anyone in my department to fight a battle that's not their problem unless they want to."
Ron shrugged. "Fair enough."
After spending hours buried in scraps of parchments and being barraged by constant streams of owls, the three had finally pulled together an acceptable list of people to go on the mission to Finland. "Are you going back to your office, Hermione?" Harry asked as she stood and started shifting through piles for her papers.
"No," she answered. "I'm going back home to see if I can get some work done before tomorrow." She thought of Simon back at the office, and how angry he would be when he heard about the mission and how he hadn't been picked to go. Maybe she should take tomorrow off, or better yet seal herself inside her office.
"I'll help you take this stuff back," Ron offered, picking up half of her things. "Bye, Harry," he called as they headed to the fireplace.
"Yeah, bye" he called back. "See you in five hours." His words only barely reached their ears as they were swept up through the fireplace.
"Thanks for helping us, by the way," Ron said as they arrived in Hermione's living room. She dropped her stuff on the white sofa messy pile. He did the same.
"That's okay," she said with a tired sigh, running her hands through her hair. "If it was anyone at the ministry besides you and Harry, I would have told you to go to hell. But I don't mind helping out friends."
"Poor Hermione," Ron said, reaching out to massage her aching shoulders. "Harry and I didn't mean to make more work for you." He leant forward and placed a gentle kiss on the side of her neck.
She smiled. "Harry'll be waiting for you," she murmured.
"No he won't."
She turned her head to kiss him. She loved the way his mouth felt on hers, so soft and warm…. she lost herself in his kiss and suddenly she found herself not in her living room, but in her bedroom, lying on her bed next to Ron, their robes on a pile on the floor. She pulled away from him and looked down at her muggle clothes and his. How did she get here like this? "How do you always do that to me?" she asked.
Ron smiled. "I'm magical."
Hermione laughed as Ron bent his head down for another kiss. She didn't object as she felt his hand creeping up her body underneath her sweater. Oscar wouldn't be home for hours. She moaned as she felt his hand reach her breast and arched her back, pushing herself into his hand. Lifting her arms, she started to tug at the black t-shirt he was wearing, trying to pull it over his head. He groaned into her mouth before quickly pulling away from her. Before she could protest, he had pulled his shirt over his head and tossed it onto the floor with their robes. "It's been too long," he said as he started to pull at her sweater.
"I know," she whispered breathlessly as she started to undo his belt buckle. Suddenly, from somewhere in the room, came a voice that was like a bucket of ice-cold water tossed over both of them.
"I hate to interrupt you, Weasley," the familiar voice said, "as this is probably the closest you've come to getting laid in months. I have some fairly important matters to discuss with your girlfriend, however."
Ron and Hermione sprang apart. In two seconds, Ron had his wand out and aimed at the intruder, keeping the defenseless Hermione behind him with one arm.
"Malfoy," he spat as he recognized the black-clad blond wizard in front of them. "What the fuck do you want?"
Malfoy raised his eyebrows slightly as a small, genuine smile touched his lips. "Oscar," he said simply.
A/N – Yes, I have a thing for cliffhangers, I know! But I promise the next update will not take anything as long as this one. I already have everything planned out in my head so it's just a matter of finding the time to type it!
I know this entry is going to make a lot of people think Malfoy is the father but – I haven't actually said that, have I? *evil cackle* I promise everything will be revealed in the next chapter, however!! And it's not too far away…..
**Sykik