She's all sharp angles. Her hair cut into a perfectly straight bob that stops at her chin, her robes crisp and elegant, both are pitch black. She's tall, she's slender, she's angular. Her eyes are either black or green - it's impossible to tell, but they're beautiful and Merlin's beard Hermione is regretting that fourth firewhiskey.
The half full fifth glass of the offending drink seems to stare at Hermione as she directs her attention at that rather than Pansy Parkinson. What the hell is Parkinson doing there anyways? Hermione has lived in Hogsmeade for five years now and she's never once seen the woman. Haven't all of the Slytherins from that year moved abroad?
She's never had much of an opinion on Parkinson - well, not since the end of the war. But now, seeing her for the first time in seven years, Hermione is practically drooling over her.
Home is probably a good place to be, she thinks.
She should go home, she also thinks.
Her hands are blurry, she continues to think.
She'll go home, she decides and downs the rest of her firewhiskey in one gulp. Hermione gets to her feet and immediately sways and stumbles and has to grab onto the bar to steady herself.
She takes a few more steps towards the door, then stops when she hears someone exclaim, "Circe's left tit, is that Hermione Granger? Drunk?"
Parkinson is leaning nonchalantly against the nearest table. She looks painfully wonderful, despite the smirk creasing her face.
"I'm an adult, Parkinson," Hermione musters, though she thinks her words are coming out slurred and, perhaps, slightly incomprehensible. "I can get drunk if I so choose."
Parkinson looks endlessly amused. "Of course, Granger. I just never expected it from miss rules-turn-me-on."
Hermione frowns. "Rules do not turn me on, I'm not Percy."
Parkinson lets out a startled cackle. "Merlin! You're full of surprises, Granger."
She departs with a loud crack! leaving Hermione bewildered and feeling very off kilter.
? ﾟﾌﾻ?
The next time Hermione sees Parkinson, it's three days later and in the Hog's Head again.
"Oh, an alcoholic, are we, Granger dear?" Parkinson asks when Hermione orders three drinks.
She glares at Parkinson out of the corner of her eye. "Hardly." She is very annoyed that Parkinson is somehow even more beautiful with sober eyes. She decides that it's just from a very long period of being single and then spotting a pretty girl while drunk has impacted her judgement.
"Sure, don't come crying to me when you end up falling all over yourself again."
"Parkinson, I haven't seen you in seven years, why would I go to you?" Hermione demands.
"You saw me on saturday," Parkinson shrugs and walks to the other side of the pub.
Hermione takes a massive swig of her drink and forces herself to look away from Parkinson's retreating figure. She locates an empty table and sets the glasses down. Harry and Ron should be arriving any minute.
?
"Drinking on a monday with Potter and Weasley?" Parkinson drawls as she drops down to sit across from Hermione. "Quite ballsy, I must say. Imagine if Saint Potter goes into work hungover on a tuesday morning, it'll be splashed all over the Daily Prophet."
Hermione doesn't let herself reveal that she's very confused by Parkinson. Her voice is smooth and calm as she says, "It was only one drink, I hardly think there'll be any hangovers for us. Besides, you're hardly one to talk."
Parkinson snorts and it's a very odd juxtaposition to her pristine appearance and movements. "Please, darling, I only come here for the food and experimental coffees."
Hermione raises an eyebrow. "Experimental coffees?"
"Oh, yes, they're on the secret menu for exceptionally gorgeous people only. Today's brew is quite divine. No, you shan't be having a sip, you simply aren't pretty enough, I'm afraid." She sips her drink. "Do you have a job, Granger?"
"Parkinson, it's half past seven. I don't work the night shifts. I take it that you don't have a job as you keep turning up?"
"I'm not getting hammered, it doesn't matter if I'm in the pub if I'm not drinking."
Then she's gone.
? ﾟﾌﾻ?
Hermione spots Parkinson in the Hog's Head every time she goes - which she only does after tough days of work to unwind. It's not her fault if everything is a maddening clusterfuck of nonsense that makes her want to throw a table out the window.
To her infinite horror, Hermione has noticed a lot of things about Parkinson besides her blinding beauty. She always dresses stylishly, her robes are always fancy, made of fine fabrics with wonderful colours, but simple and they suit her very well. Thanks to the increasingly hot days of June, Hermione knows she always wears long sleeved shirts that usually tuck into high waisted shorts and skirts under her robes, if she's even wearing robes at all. She has something tattooed on both arms but Hermione can never see more than a flash of a black beneath the cuffs of her shirt.
Pansy Parkinson is the most mysterious person Hermione has ever met. And for some reason, she's kept their odd little talks secret from everyone, even Harry and Ron. It all just feels... surreal. When Parkinson isn't talking to her, she's hardly sure if the woman's even real or not.
"Five days in a row, Granger?" Parkinson asks one saturday. "I think you've got a bit of a problem. Is it the Weasel? Having a lover's spat?"
"Ron and I have never been lovers," Hermione replies with a slow, deliberate voice. She's on her third glass of firewhiskey and trying not to make it show.
"My point still stands. Five days, Granger."
"And you care why?"
"Oh, I don't. I'm just a nosy bitch," Parkinson says with a blasé wave of the hand. "Don't mind me while I figure out how Hermione Granger, the brightest witch of her age, has turned to alcoholism."
"I'm not an alcoholic," Hermione says.
Parkinson raises an eyebrow and shrugs. "Sure, dear. Don't come in here for one month and I'll believe you."
Hermione sighs. "What?"
"Either you stay out of here for one month or I start smashing every glass of firewhiskey you order. Just to annoy you."
"You wou-"
Parkinson slaps the half empty glass to the ground. It smashes and the new barman begins growling at the both of them. "If that happens again, you'll both be tossed out," he says.
The grin Parkinson adopts is that of a shark. Hermione feels like she might have a leg bitten off and she knows Parkinson will absolutely shatter more glasses.
"Merlin, fine," Hermione snaps.
"You said that the way an alcoholic would say it," Parkinson says.
She disapparates.
? ﾟﾌﾻ?
Hermione isn't an alcoholic, but maybe she does have a bit of a problem. It's not her fault that everyone at the Ministry is an incompetent, uncaring beaurocrat. As the head of the Being Division of the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, she has to deal with a lot of absolutely inane nonsense.
? ﾟﾌﾻ?
"Figures I'd run into you in a quill shop."
Hermione turns her head and really shouldn't be as surprised as she is to see Parkinson leaning over a short shelf of Limited Edition Peacock Feather Quick Quotes Quills. She's wearing a dark, cranberry red blouse with black lace emerging from the low cut square neckline. There's a tattoo on the right side of her chest, just below her clavicle, a downward facing triangle with a line through it. Her arms are folded over the top of the shelf and Hermione thinks she must be doing this on purpose.
"What's that supposed to mean?" Hermione asks with a frown.
Parkinson smirks. "I'm fairly sure what I mean is obvious."
"No, enlighten me."
"You seem the type to fuck a book."
Hermione's face heats up and she turns back to the quills she was perusing. "Don't be crude."
"Ah, but you've not denied it."
"Parkinson," Hermione sighs, "I would rather like to purchase some quills without your..." She initially trails off to figure out what the right word to use would be, but then her silence is entirely because Parkinson has walked around the shelf and now Hermione can see that she's chosen to wear one of those short, high waisted shorts and combat boots.
It's a painfully attractive outfit and Hermione hates it.
"Without my what?" Parkinson asks with a quirked eyebrow and an amused glint in her eye.
"Your inappropriate distractions," Hermione says before she can think through the implications of her words.
"Oh, my distractions!" Parkinson says in a suspiciously gleeful voice. Hermione is horrified that she notices the way her hips curve as she leans against the wall.
The quills. Focus on the quills, Hermione tells herself and snaps her eyes to the box of self inking quills. Maybe if she ignores Parkinson she'll go away? She usually just suddenly leaves. Maybe the next time Hermione looks up, she'll just be gone.
She grabs the self inking quills.
Parkinson is still there.
Parkinson has grabbed a box of the exact same type of quills.
Parkinson is walking up to the till along with Hermione.
She has to be doing this on purpose. She's fucking with Hermione, she just has to be.
? ﾟﾌﾻ?
"So let me get this straight," Ron says. "You aren't going to the Hog's Head because Pansy Parkinson thinks you have a drinking problem? That's ridiculous!"
They're in a nice little muggle diner near the Ministry for lunch.
"Yes, well, I'm not exactly keen on being banned for life just because I want a drink." Hermione replies. "Parkinson's already shattered one glass, she'll shatter more. And I suppose I have been visiting the bar rather a lot lately."
"Yeah, but you don't have a drinking problem," Harry says. He's looking haggard and like he might just collapse at any moment. For a hospital, St Mungo's certainly didn't seem to care about it's staff.
"Either way, it's probably for the better. You two have given me your absolutely atrocious destressing habits."
"Hey, I don't drink anymore," Harry exclaims.
"Only because you're on call for St Mungo's at all hours of the day," Hermione says rather dryly. "And you don't do anything to destress anymore, either. Which you should, you look like a walking corpse."
"I'm perfectly fine!" he says indignantly.
"She's right, love," Ron says and Harry shoots him a scowl. He opens his mouth as if he's about protest, but the protean charmed bracelet on his wrist vibrated.
"Shit, I've got to go," he says and runs out of the diner, only stopping to drop a peck on Ron's cheek.
Hermione and Ron watch him leave and are silent for a moment until Ron turns to Hermione and says, "I still think you're mental."
? ﾟﾌﾻ?
"Ugh, she keeps showing up everywhere," Hermione mutters, turning away from the rack of robes she was perusing in Gladrags Wizardwear.
Ginny lowers the dress she was examing to glance at Hermione. "I think you're being a bit paranoid. Isn't this usually Harry's area of expertise?'
"I'm not being paranoid," Hermione insists. "I haven't seen her since graduation and now she's just there. Constantly. That's not normal."
"Well, maybe she just moved here." Ginny places the dress back. "Now, let's focus on the matter at hand; what should I wear for my date tonight?"
Hermione sighs and reluctantly drops the subject. "What sort of things are you going to do on your date?" She doesn't ask who the lucky lady is, Ginny has had a slew of first dates in the last several years and almost all of them ended in disaster.
"Just dinner, nothing fancy," she shrugs. "I've decided against flying dates ever since Evelynn nearly fainted when I handed her one of my brooms." Ginny had the very bad luck of attracting women who were just enamoured with her because she was one of the Holyhead Harpies Chasers.
Hermione pauses, looks Ginny up and down and glances around the shop for ideas. "Maybe that denim jacket you have with a tank top and jeans?" she suggests rather uncertainty. It's an outfit type that she remembers liking very much during the months that they dated.
"Hmm, maybe." Ginny tilts her head to the side in thought. "I'll go take a look at the tank tops. Shout if you find any good dress robes." She walks off to the casual wear section and Hermione is left to leave it to her willpower to not look at Parkinson over in the accessories section.
She desperately wished that dress robes were more interesting, because it really was hard to keep her eyes away from Parkinson. She's being ridiculous. She's twenty-six for Merlin's sake and she's acting like a fifteen year old. She shouldn't have to struggle to keep her eyes off of a woman that she hasn't seen since she was nineteen and hadn't properly thought about since she was eighteen.
Maybe lilac would be a good colour for her, Hermione forces herself to think. She reaches out for the lilac robes and immediately decides against it when she feels it's stiff and scratchy fabric. She goes for a yellow one next, but the fabric is so silky it has trouble staying in her fingers.
"Go for periwinkle."
Hermione whips around and comes face to face with Pansy fucking Parkinson. Of bloody course, who else would it be? Ginny? Of course not, she thinks bitterly, her luck just wouldn't allow that.
"What?" she says.
Parkinson pulls out a luxurious blue-purple robe from the racks and shoves it into Hermione's hands. "Periwinkle, dear," she drawls. "If you go for that lilac it'll make you look ill and the cut of that yellow one is all wrong for you."
Hermione doesn't want to think about why Parkinson would know what robes would look good on her, and she doesn't get time to as Parkinson performs her little disappearing act yet again.
"Did she approach you or did you approach her?" Ginny asks when she returns with a pile of shirts tucked under her arms.
"What do you think," Hermione replied dryly.
"And what did she want?"
"She, um, told me to get these robes."
Ginny eyes the dress robes and slowly adopts an understanding expression that Hermione doesn't understand. "It'll look great on you, Mione," she says with an amused smile.
Hermione wants to ask what the expression's for, but she doesn't.
? ﾟﾌﾻ?
The next time Hermione sees Parkinson, it's in Tomes and Scrolls, the Hogsmeade bookshop. And it's in the romance section.
Trashy romance novels are Hermione's guilty pleasure that no one other than Luna and Ginny know about and now Parkinson is seeing her holding a book with a pair of particularly busty women standing in a not necessarily family friendly way. She feels her face burning in embarrassment.
"I knew you'd fuck a book," is what Parkinson says.
Hermione splutters and says, "I'm not - that's - this isn't-"
Parkinson practically cackles. "Calm down, Granger. Did you get those robes I pointed out to you?"
"Uh, yeah," she admits.
"Excellent! What were they for?"
"Work," Hermione replies simply, not wanting to get into the disaster that was that particular plea to be listened to.
Parkinson doesn't press and instead deftly extends a slender finger to pull a book from the shelves. "In that case, since my taste is so unquestionably exquisite," she drops the book onto Hermione's pile of books that she has floating beside her, "read that. You'll like it."
And then she's gone.
Hermione puts back the book she's holding and grabs the one that Parkinson added to the pile. Sleepwalking by Moonlight by Violet June.
It's rather thicker than most romance books and a hardcover rather than a paperback and has no book jacket. It's a nice shade of pink, the title is written in a graceful, golden script and has a simple imprint of the moon in the centre of the cover as it's only decoration. There is no summary that Hermione can find, which normally irritates her beyond belief, but she's intrigued and sets it back on the stack.