With a grunt of exertion Draco pulled the floorboard beneath where his armchair usually stood loose and tossed it aside.

"Wow. That must be worth a fortune." Hermione let out a low whistle, shocked at the size of the gems glittering in the large space beneath the floor Draco had just exposed.

"You married into a family of wealth Granger, were you not aware?" Draco lifted the gems out with great care, and placed them in the silver box Hermione was holding.

"Sorry, I'd forgotten." Hermione replied dryly, setting the ornate box full of unimaginable wealth on the mantel above the fireplace gingerly.

"Okay, I'd say there's enough room in here for the best of the liquor cabinet, and maybe some of your books." Draco decided after examining the available space. They'd already sorted all of Draco's alcohol collection into two piles, staying and going, and it had been a long and painful process for the borderline alcoholic Malfoy.

Hermione's books had been even more difficult.

"I have to carry this baby, my books are going in." Hermione was firm as she passed Draco the pile of her selected muggle favourites.

They'd spent the last two days adjusting their apartment to the ministry appointed standards they'd received along with their 90 day house arrest.

The list was incredibly ridiculous, but their lives as witches and wizards depended on it.

Hermione had already taken a leave of absence from her job, which had saddened her greatly but she had no choice. She thought this would be when she found out what Draco usually did with his day, but she never saw him call anyone or cancel his schedule in anyway. She was still curious about his goings on, but she now had more pressing things to deal with.

There was a strict ban on alcohol and candy, both rules of which had sent Draco into an agonizing spiral in which he had questioned how much he liked being a wizard, but the answer had been inevitable.

He couldn't exist without this life. And neither could Hermione.

But, when her list had included a section on banned muggle media, and most of her non-wizarding books had made the banned list, she had felt the desperation necessary to break the rules.

She and Draco had made a pact, they would follow the list absolutely, except they would each keep one thing, the most important, and it would go in Draco's secret hiding spot beneath the floor.

So in went classics like Lord of the Rings and Pride and Prejudice, and classics like hundred year old wines from Vienna and a sixty year old bourbon from Tennessee.

"Is that toffee?" Hermione asked accusatorily, spying the shiny wrapper as Draco went to lock in their treasures with the floorboard.

"So what if it is? Man's gotta eat." Draco said defensively, fitting in the floorboard before Hermione could protest further.

"You made me sacrifice Lord of the Flies so you could stash your candy?" Hermione was mildly furious but also deeply amused. "Unbelievable."

Draco shrugged sheepishly before jumping up and pushing his armchair back into position, covering their secret.

"Okay, next, making this apartment a co-ed affair."

They spent the rest of the day rearranging the apartment to fit both Hermione's and Draco's things.

They bickered over almost everything but managed to reach compromises. Hermione got 70% of the book shelves for all of her wizardry books, and Draco retained ownership of the trunk at the end of their bed.

The wardrobe they split 50/50, as they did the bathroom cabinets.

Hermione insisted on mixing her towels and linen in with Draco's so they could use both, a demand Draco only complied with by first ordering her to dispose of all the flannelette sheets.

"Only crisp sheets in this house." He'd told her smugly as she begrudgingly folded them into the box of things they going to donate to second hand shops.

They moved Hermione's dresser in, squeezing it onto her side of the bed, and set up her jewellery box and perfumes on it. Crookshank's bed was set up on top of Draco's trunk at the foot of the bed, a lavish pile of blankets and cushions serving as his own private palace.

Crookshanks however preferred sleeping in the big bed with his owners, Draco's chest being his sleeping place of preference, much to Hermione's irritation.

They had to adhere to a new healthy eating plan, something Hermione would have a lot less trouble adjusting to than Draco, though she couldn't cook with half the ingredients on the list so he would end up taking on most of this responsibility.

Both had a list of fertility potions and vitamins they had to start taking as well. In their pantry they had a magical section, and as they were both avid potion makers, this didn't present much of a problem, though Hermione found most of the ones she had to drink tasted foul.

For some reason the ministry hadn't banned cell phones, and both she and Draco had one, though Hermione suspected Draco barely understood how to use his.

They also had new exercise regimes to follow, and worst of all, the ministry, having updated its knowledge a little, had included an ovulation tracker and alarm.

Hermione had given up on explaining how the female body worked to Draco and eventually googled it and let him read the information himself.

He'd seemed a little scarred afterward and still hadn't ceased asking her disbelieving questions.

However despite the hurdles, the task of bring their lifestyles together the way they had had cleared a lot of their communication barriers. They were able to talk to each other, without much effort being made. Communicating had become more natural, certainly.

However they still had two major tasks to deal with.

Firstly, they had to start shopping and going out together, no more than once a day, and they had to stay together.

Secondly, they had to have sex again, and they had to start doing it regularly.

In fact, according to their lists, every time Hermione was ovulating they had to have sex, and the list also encouraged extra-curricular sexual activity, to help bring a sense of normalcy to the act.

And while talking was getting easier, Hermione was in no way eager to re-live that experience.

Neither was Draco, who, despite himself, enjoyed aggravating Hermione and found that arguing with her was starting to ignite something pleasant within him, but still felt apprehensive about their marital duties.

He felt like they'd reached a stage where they were almost friends, kind of like frenemies, who bantered a bit.

But they were not passionate lovers, they weren't wild for each other, the tension in the air was decidedly unsexual, and the pressure of their house arrest only served to dampen their spirits.

Five days in they still hadn't slept together.

Hermione had been on the phone with her friends for most of that afternoon, deciding, now that she couldn't see them, how ridiculous it had been to avoid them.

She had been embarrassed by her situation, but now reached out to Parvati and Luna, and Harry, unloading her struggles and listening to their woes in turn. She found out Luna had been paired with Neville Longbottom and was quite pleased despite the circumstances. Parvati had ended up with Dean Thomas, and she said that at least they were already friends, it could've been much worse. Both girls pitied Hermione, both had nothing good to say about Draco, and why would they? She went along with what they said, not defending her husband at all, since everything they slandered him for he had actually done.

However after she had hung up she found she didn't feel good about the conversation, her choice to allow them to mock Draco not sitting as well as she thought it would.

Talking to Harry had been the hardest. He was dismayed with his marriage, Hermione could tell he was miserable, but couldn't help. She knew he was in love with someone else, he had told her as much back when he first married Ginny, but he hadn't told her who and he remained as mum now as he had back then.

She had offered him as much support a she could, reminding him that she loved him dearly before ending that conversation as well.

A little tearful from the emotional conversations she wiped her eyes on her sleeve and got up from her chair by the fire. She had accessorised it to suit her, draping it in a fluffy red blanket and giving her plushest cushion a place of honour on its seat.

The apartment was feeling more like home, which was nice, but also unsettling, as she realized how much she had adjusted already.

Draco didn't love all the changes to his bachelor pad, but found most of them tolerable. What he didn't find tolerable was how much Hermione was avoiding the conversation of their sex life.

He resented how she was making him the one who always had to bring it up. She needed to take on her share of the responsibility, not to mention, going from having sex often, with many willing women, to not having sex at all, and his only option was a very un-willing woman, kind of sucked.

He knew it was selfish, but he was young, he was horny and he cooped up inside his house with no one but the woman he was supposed to impregnate.

Sex seemed like the most obvious solution.