A/N: Here comes the last shot before I bury my nose deep into my Chemistry books. And then, you never know when I'll post.
WARNING: Those who are extremely allergic to sweetness and fluffy cotton candies, this chapter may cause you diabetes. But then, read it anyway :P
The birds twittered and the alarm decided to ring up as the couple slept soundlessly, huddled all together. The wife groaned and smacked the alarm off, as the husband pulled her closer by the waist. Her mouth emitted a small groan, as she snuggled deeper into his warmth and slowly opening her eyes, to watch him sleep. All of a sudden, a stream of babbles was heard from the baby monitor, when she shookher husband, wakinghim up.
"John, go check on Heather." Jean said sleepily.
"It's your turn today." John said in a equally tired voice. "I was up yesterday since five in the morning, tending her bum and her cries."
"But-" Jean stopped, when he heard a third person cooing, as the baby's babbling changed to shrieks to excitement. She smiled to herself, and closed her eyes, resting her head on John's chest.
"It's a good thing Minnie is here." She said, hearing the laughs and giggles of her two precious ones through the monitor. "It's such a help."
"What are you suggesting?" John asked cheekily.
Jean laughed and leaned over to give her husband a nice, morning kiss. Breaking away, she said "A morning shag maybe? What do you say? You know we're still in our twenties."
John laughed and kissed her again. "And we have a nineteen year old and a six months old daughter." He added, placing a peck on her lips. "Lets just lie down for longer and leave the sisters to bond shall we?"
Hermione woke to a babbling Heather through the baby monitor charm she had placed on her nursery. Smiling to herself, she moaned slightly, finding herself trapped underneath her husband. Draco was lying half on top of her, his head resting on her chest, one of his arms draped around her waist, while the other pillowing his head. Hermione chuckled as Heather shrieked and Draco's eyes snapped open.
"Merlin, she's such a screamer." Draco mumbled, placing an innocent kiss on top of Hermione's breast. Her eyes widened in shock as the blonde grunted and placed his head deeper into her neck.
"Move you oaf! I need to check on her." Hermione said with a chuckle, pushing Draco by his shoulder, who obliged and rolled off her.
"There, I did you a favor." He said sleepily. "Now will you please shut her up and let me sleep?"
"Don't be such a whiny baby." Hermione scoffed, getting up and grabbing her night robe from the door hook. "What will you do when you have a child of your own?"
The brunette then realized the words which left her mouth and found her husband smirking with his eyes shut.
"Imagining already?" He asked.
Hermione rolled her eyes and opened the door. "You wish." She said, before shutting the door and walking into her sister's nursery, finding Heather, playing with her soft football as she sat in her crib.
"Look who's wakey!" Hermione exclaimed as Heather looked at her and screamed, as she was scooped up into her sister's arms. "Oh! Lets not wake mummy and daddy shall we?"
Heather kept jumping excitedly in Hermione's arms, her small hands pulling on the messy curls. The brunette chuckled and placed a soft kiss on the baby's mouth, when only the mini-Granger kept leaning into Hermione's lips for more.
"Oh stop it Heathy!" Her sister chuckled and placed a kiss on her head. "No more mouthy kisses. Draco won't like it. But I love you more baby." Hermione caressed her nose with Heather's. "Yes I do."
Heather then looked into her identical brown eyes, as her hands darted to caress Hermione's freckled cheeks. The baby had grown closer to her nineteen year old sister, than she was to anyone else, knowing that she was very special to her.
"Happy Christmas Heathy." Hermione said softly, placing a kiss on Heather's small head as the baby kept cooing. "Want to open the presents?"
The baby's eyes lit up as she gave an excited squeal and clapped her hands when Hermione had no option, other than carrying her to the living room and setting her down next to the Granger Christmas tree. Stars grew into Heather's eyes at the sight of so many, colorful boxes as she crawled over to them, and started to slam her stubby hands on the big box covered with blue paper.
"Oh Heathy! That's not for you!" Hermione exclaimed with a chuckle, crawling over to her sister and moving the gift away from her. "That's mummy's."
Heather made a noise of disagreement, when Hermione found one of Heather's gifts and handed it over to her. The baby's eyes gleamed at the sight of the pink package that she managed to get hold of it and started to hit it on the floor. Hermione chuckled and gently took the present from her hand and opened it. Heather kept looking at her sister in fascination, when only her eyes met with a pink teddy bear.
"Boo!" Hermione said, at which, Heather looked at the toy and laughed. Handing the teddy bear to Heather, she brought the baby into her lap. "This was from me baby." She cooed. "Did you like it?"
Little did the Granger girls know that their father was standing behind them, looking at his baby girls open presents. Heather was only a meek baby as she laughed, playing with her new toy. While Hermione, his baby Minnie had all grown up. Every Christmas, till the age of eight, she used to jump on the bed and wake her parents up, just to open the presents. She might've grown old and gotten married now, but his nineteen year old Hermione was still his little Minnie who loved chocolates, books, presents and above all, Christmas.
It was when Jean came down with a camera and found her husband, nearly in tears as he gazed at his two beautiful daughters. She smiled and laid a hand on his shoulder, letting him know that she also had the very same thoughts in her mind.
"Time flies doesn't it?" She asked as her husband nodded. "In no time Heather will also grow up, just like her sister, our Minnie-"
"Don't Jean." John said in a hushed voice. "Lets just stay in this moment and see them like this." He smiled when Jean switched on the camera and took a snap of the two sisters as they played, laughed and giggled.
At the sudden flash, two pairs of brown eyes averted to their parents while their perfect teeth (only in Hermione's case) gave them huge smiles. Heather shrieked when she found a certain blonde walking down the stairs, making the Grangers turn to look at the clone of Adonis yawning like a little kid.
"Good morning." Draco wished, giving a kiss on Jean's cheek and smiling at John. "Happy Christmas."
"To you too son." John said, giving a pat on his shoulder. "Had a goodnight sleep?"
"An amazing one, now that you have asked." The Slytherin replied with a smile. "And both your daughters woke me up. One with her shrieks and one with a shove on my shoulder."
"At least we proved to be useful." Hermione interjected as Heather kept playing with her teddy.
"Sure you did." Draco said with a smile, as he walked over to her and bent down to give her a chaste kiss on the lips. Hermione had intentionally forgotten that Heather was on her lap and her parents were probably ogling at them, as she responded to her husband's kiss with joy.
Draco broke away and sat next to her. "Happy Christmas."
"Same to you." Hermione said with a blush as Heather crawled into Draco's lap and clutched on his sweatshirt. Jean and John too, decided to join along with the young ones and exchange presents.
Draco laughed at Heather kept slapping his face with her stubby hands and fought back by tickling her miniature waist. "You little demon! Your sister loves me more!" He said playfully, earning a look from Hermione which he ignored. Heather kept slapping him and screamed when he finally tickled her mercilessly and gave a kiss on her nose.
"Nah, I find you more annoying than her." Hermione joked. "And her even more lovelier."
Draco rolled his eyes when Hermione clapped her hands like an excited little child and said "Now lets open more presents!"
The others chuckled at her behavior when the others started to open their gifts, turn by turn. Heather's was opened first. She had got a teddy bear from Hermione (whose ear, she was happily chewing with her toothless gums), a collection of bedtime stories from her mother ("You all should know that I used to read Minnie stories at Heather's age. And now, look at the outcome." Jean explained, earning a hearty laugh from others.), a pink fairy dress from her father and a silver tiara from Draco.
"Draco dear, you didn't need to do this." Jean look at her son-in-law with a smell smile on her face.
"Don't say no to it Jean." The blonde smiled. "It's a tradition to gift such things to a newborn in our family. And Heather is a part of my family, she deserves all of this."
John chuckled and said "In a few years time, I'm sure you'll spoil her more than I will."
"You never know dad." Hermione said with a smile. "He's already spoiling me enough."
"I intend to spoil both your daughters." Draco said playfully, earning a huge laughter from the three Grangers and a squeal from Heather.
"Anyway Minnie, its your turn to open up your presents now!" Jean announced when Hermione hunted the huge bundle for her gifts and started to open them one by one.
Her parents gifted her a jewelry set. Harry and Susan, the latest edition of 'Hogwarts A History' ("How many of those copies do you have dear?" John asked playfully.) Ginny and Blaise, a new quill. To her surprise, Ron, a huge bag of Bertie Botts Every Flavor Beans. Then she found a small velvet box, lying quietly amidst of all the gifts. She picked it up and opened it, to find a key, tagged with a Malfoy symbol. She questioningly looked at her husband, who scooted closer to her and asked "What is this? Don't tell me you're gifting me a property or anything-"
"As a matter of fact, I am." Draco cut her off and answered her questioning brown eyes. "It's not a property as such, it's in my name but-" giving a kiss on her cheek, he continued. "You deserve it. We will be spending the rest of our honeymoon there. Lets say, it's our future home."
Hermione smiled shyly, when she heard her mother clear her throat. They had never realized when Heather crawled out of Draco's lap and had sat in her father's, giving the young couple a giggle.
"Minnie, what was that all about?" Jean asked when instead if Hermione, Draco answered.
"Well Jean, we were just planning our Christmas night in Switzerland. That's all."
It was almost after nine hours, when Hermione found herself, facing the tall alpine mountains, topped with pure, white snow as the sun started to set beyond the horizon. She still couldn't fathom that Draco had gifted her the Malfoy cottage in a place like Zermatt, where everything seemed so quite and peaceful. 'I had to gift you something special, you know.' He had said. All of his responses and gesture made Hermione wonder, whether-
'He loves me?'
The Gryffindor was having this internal debate for the past one month. But then, she still didn't understand why would he ever fall in love with her. Her train of thoughts were put on a halt, when she found herself being wrapped in a pair of strong arms. She smiled when she felt her husband, planting a kiss on her ear.
"Did you like it?" He asked, placing another kiss on her shoulder.
"I loved it." Hermione smiled and turned to give a peck on his lips. "Thank you."
"You're always welcome." Draco said, tugging her curls. "Anyway, it's almost nine an we already had dinner, do you have something else in mind? Maybe, we could use the jacuzzi or-"
"Jacuzzi sounds great." Hermione smiled.
"Okay then, I'll go and turn it on. Will be waiting. Don't make it long."
"I won't let you complain about my timing."
Draco chuckled, nodded and left for their Jacuzzi arena, leaving Hermione to wonder what to give for his Christmas gift and she knew whatever was in her head would please him and she would overcome her fear of being loved intimately by the man she was now falling for.
A/N: Short chapter! Pardon me! And I have a feeling that you know the last line suggested something. But you see, I'm evil enough to make you wait to let you know 'how' it happens. Until then, toodles! ;) ^^