One night, when the tip of Hermione's quill snapped off in the middle of a sentence, she snuck into Draco's study to look for a new one. The man was meticulously organized, and she rolled her eyes when she saw that the surface of his desk was completely devoid of any quills or parchment.
She pulled open the topmost drawer and was about to rummage through it for quills when something else caught her eye.
There, lying on top of a neat stack of parchment, was an old photograph that she recognized from years ago, now faded and yellowing with age. She picked it up and stared at herself shaking the Minister's hand, beaming at the camera as she enjoyed her first taste of success at the Ministry. The clipping still bore lines where she'd folded it, and its edges were rough and uneven from having been ripped hastily out of the paper.
She couldn't believe he still had it after all these years.
She watched the scene over and over before replacing the picture in his desk, where he'd kept it so carefully, and shutting the drawer. Then she left the study, having forgotten entirely why she'd entered.
Hermione had not seen George in over a year when she ran into him outside the Leaky Cauldron. So she took him up on his offer of lunch, and once they'd exchanged the usual pleasantries and caught up over Butterbeer, he broached a subject that neither Harry nor Ron had been brave enough to explore.
"So, I have to ask," he said. "Are you actually happy with Malfoy?"
She smiled uncomfortably in response. "I'm fine, George."
"Yeah, but—that's not the same as being happy, is it? I know you can handle yourself, Hermione, but I just want to make sure you know what you're doing."
Hermione looked down at her Butterbeer and laughed darkly. "Well, if that's what you're asking—then no, I can't quite say that I do."
The Manor was far too big for one married couple—even a married couple that slept in separate bedrooms. It didn't help that Hermione spent so much time at the Ministry that she'd barely had a chance to explore the place. At least twice a month, she got lost and wandered blindly around the halls before calling for a house elf to come rescue her.
But when she made a wrong turn on her way to the Owlery, having been misguided by a mischievous portrait, she accidentally stumbled upon something far better: the library.
Draco found her hours later, still staring up in awe at the shelves, her unsent letter long forgotten. She was clutching a stack of books that she had already selected for reading, and she was so mesmerized by the treasures before her that she didn't even notice him enter.
"How'd you find it?" he asked, and she was so startled that she nearly tripped over the carpet as she turned to face him.
"Oh—um, I just—I found it by accident."
He was wearing an odd, almost dreamy expression as he walked up to her, as though he were lost in his own reverie.
"Every day that I've been in here for the past several years," he said softly, growing closer and closer until his lips were hovering just over hers, "I've thought about what your face would look like the first time you saw it."
She kissed him then, for the first time since the day he'd proposed, and it was everything their marriage was not—soft, warm, tender. When he responded eagerly, arms snaking around her waist to pull her closer, she dropped the books and reached for him with both hands.
His fingers slipped under the hem of her blouse, gliding up her back, while hers fumbled with the clasp of his robes. She pressed her hands against his chest impatiently, feeling the lines of his body before she could see them; while he slowly dragged his palms up the backs of her thighs, then up further still. She kissed him more urgently, wrapping one leg around his waist and leaning into him as she slid her hands inside the fabric of his shirt and over the heat of his bare skin. When he buried his face in the crook of her neck and ground roughly against her in response, she felt as though they would never be close enough.
Her last coherent thought before he pulled her down onto the floor was how ironic it was that, despite having waited months to consummate their marriage, they were now too impatient to wait until they were even close to undressed.
Later, she regretted asking for a separate bedroom, though she was too proud to admit it.
They continued to sleep apart; but he woke her on some nights, sliding into her bed beside her while she was still asleep. On those nights, they made frantic, desperate love, emboldened by the darkness and the emotional protection it afforded. On those nights, she clung to him with a vulnerability that she could never have shown in daylight.
Then, when dawn had broken, they returned to wearing their usual masks.
Their relationship was passionate but tumultuous, and it was nothing resembling a normal marriage—but then again, what had she expected, marrying Draco Malfoy? Life was suddenly a roller coaster in which she could never predict what awaited her each day. Draco was witty and smart, but he could also be spiteful and terribly cruel. When the two of them were on the same side, there was no stopping them: no one understood each other or got along as well as they did. But when they fought, they were the bitterest of enemies; that they knew each other so well also meant that they knew better than anyone how to hit one another where it hurt most.
It was frustrating, maddening, vaguely thrilling. What was there to do besides succumb to the ride and hang on for dear life?
For Christmas, Draco got her Clemens' job. It was one of the top posts in the department; and it came with a spacious corner office, an assistant, and a seat on the Wizengamot. Hermione had not thought it possible—whoever was in charge of overseeing legislation had an unthinkable amount of power and influence, and surely such a position could not be bought—but it seemed that Draco's clout with the Ministry knew no bounds.
Hermione's Christmas present to Draco was a book.
She wanted to thank him somehow, so she asked him out for a celebratory dinner and made her first effort as a married woman to impress her husband. While he waited downstairs, in the drawing room, she put on the only sexy dress she had and pulled her hair up into a tight chignon.
The look on his face when she entered seemed strangely familiar, and as he stared numbly at her from across the room, she realized that she'd seen it once before—at the Yule Ball in fourth year.
They never made it to dinner.
Within seconds, he'd backed her into the wall and twisted one hand into her updo to unravel it—half an hour's work wasted, she thought to herself—while slipping her dress down over her shoulders with the other. His mouth was hot and wet against the side of her neck, then her collarbone, then her stomach, and then somewhere else entirely.
Somewhere in the back of her mind, right before she lost herself completely, she had the dark thought that this was not the first time this room had been filled with her screams.
Hermione's new role in the MLE not only gave her the power to pass reforms on house elf rights, but it also afforded her a political importance that made it easier to recruit S.P.E.W. donors than ever before. Countless Ministry officials—as well as other individuals interested in the fate of various pending legislation—were suddenly deeply interested in the small organization Hermione had helmed since her fourth year at Hogwarts.
Expressing his disdain for the small, unremarkable fundraisers she had always hosted, Draco insisted on throwing a lavish benefit in her stead. "You're a Malfoy now," he sniffed, "and I won't have you embarrassing me."
The impressive party he planned on S.P.E.W.'s behalf ended up being the event of the season. Tickets sold so fast that they moved the benefit from the Manor to a larger venue that could accommodate more guests. Hermione gave a passionate speech on the state of elf rights and the importance of compassion, and S.P.E.W. raised record numbers in a single night.
Throughout the evening, he stood at her side, one hand affectionately tucked around her waist as he hobnobbed with the guests, the very image of a supportive and loving husband. The ingratiating smile he wore as he charmed his way through conversations, talking up S.P.E.W. and its accomplishments, suddenly seemed less irritating to Hermione than it had in the past. Yes, everything about his flattering demeanor was false—and he was so good at faking it, too—but from this angle, with him on her side, it seemed less infuriating somehow. Endearing, even.
Hermione knew it was not real, but she couldn't stop herself from enjoying the feeling, if only for a night, of having a husband who was there for her—who cared about her. She dreaded the end of the event: the moment when all the attendees would clear out and she would be left alone with him. She knew what would happen. The illusion would evaporate before her eyes; and just as if Cinderella's clock had struck midnight, her adoring husband would transform back into his usual guarded self.
So she smiled, too, and watched wistfully as he expertly maneuvered his way through conversation after conversation, occasionally turning to look at her in a way that felt so convincingly tender, it was hard to believe it wasn't genuine.