He unlocked the window and pushed up the sash. He handed her the bottle and swung a leg over the window sill until he could toe the fire escape. Once he was sure of his footing, Draco swung the other leg over and beckoned for her to follow.
"Come on, Granger! It's perfectly safe," he said with a grin. "Well… safe-ish."
"I suppose you aren't luring me to my doom," she said, handing the bottle back to him through the open window.
"I'm trying to get you onto the roof to see the stars," he said. He held out his hand.
"We're in the middle of the city! The light will block the stars out."
"We won't know that for sure unless we go up there ourselves," Draco said. "Besides, if we can't see them, we could just make out like teenagers."
Hermione giggled. "But it's cold!"
He leaned inside so they were nose-to-nose. "I intend to keep you warm," he murmured.
Her eyes flicked down to his lips. "Is that a promise?" she whispered back. They stared at each other with dreamy, mischievous smiles. "There he is."
Draco looked over his shoulder and then back to her, puzzled. "Who?"
"The Draco I've missed." She left it at that. Hermione took his hand and joined him on the fire escape.
He wondered, as they ascended the steps of the fire escape, what she could possibly mean. They had been attached at the hip for nearly three whole days-she didn't have a chance to miss him! And he had only just opened up to her; they hadn't gotten close enough in their past for her to grow attached to him. And why would she have wanted to? She couldn't possibly miss being relentlessly teased.
"What did you mean?" he asked, as they reached the roof. "Which Draco did you miss?"
Hermione stepped over the short wall and onto the gravel-laden flat roof. She rubbed her arms and smiled. "While I admit not missing most facets of our younger selves-"
"I was going to say!"
"-shh!" she giggled, pulling him to the center of the open rooftop. She took his hands in hers. "I missed that tenacity that you had back then."
He cringed. "I'd hardly call my pig-headedness 'tenacious'."
"You have a hard time taking a compliment," she laughed.
"That was a compliment? Oh. I do apologize. Try complimenting me again, and I'll practice." He stepped back from her and tucked his hands behind his back. "Go on, let me have it."
Hermione crossed her arms and pretended to seriously survey him. "You have excellent shoulders."
He scoffed. "Is that the best you've got?"
"What? I find them to be a striking mix of robust and humble, which are essential qualities in a nice shoulder," she said, eyes twinkling. Draco nodded thoughtfully, trying to keep a straight face.
"And what of my stride? Do you find it robust?" he paced before her in a mimicry of even the silliest runway-quality struts. Hermione nearly snorted.
"Both robust AND audacious," she said. She finally gave in to giggles. "Sweet Merlin, you have quite the silly side!"
"Only for you," he said, pulling her against his chest with a grin.
"You have kind eyes," she said. She brushed her fingers across his temple, where his skin crinkled when he smiled. Those grey eyes softened and he pressed his lips to her forehead.
"You bring it out in me," he whispered against her skin. "This is not who I am."
She linked her hands behind his back and looked up at him. "Who?"
"This giddy adolescent," he said with a chuckle.
"Now THAT I can believe," she giggled. "You've never been the giddy sort. Maybe you've turned over a new leaf."
He considered her with a slight smile plastered on his face. He noticed how she wrinkled her nose when he stared at her, which told him that she was embarrassed to be admired. He noticed how her curls always seemed most likely to come unwrangled in the evening, when the elastic tie sagged under the weight of her thick mane and allowed little tendrils to escape down her back. He noticed how her brown eyes shone gold when she was tired. He noticed how she curled into the shelter of his chest, how she memorized the muscles in his back with her fingertips, how she fit her forehead into the crook of his neck, at once hiding her face from him and yet letting him feel her comfort. Draco suddenly felt a great responsibility to keep her from harm of any sort. He would read her a thousand books if it meant preventing papercuts, even. No amount of care was too much for what she deserved. He wanted to apparate back to the cottage every night if it meant giving her the ocean every morning. Nothing mattered like Granger-not to him. Not anymore.
How utterly terrifying. How utterly worth it.
If she wanted to stay… if the thought of staying with him didn't frighten her out of her wits, perhaps he should offer his home while she looked for a new flat. Not the cottage by the sea, but the one in London, here. Where he would be, too. Where they could be together and safe, and he could pay back her forgiveness in tiny acts of gratitude every single day, as long as she would let him. He hadn't lived with another person in almost ten years, but it seemed worth a try. After all, they had already made it through a weekend confined to a small cottage. She had seen his gaping emotional wounds. She hadn't run away screaming.
He played with a lock of hair at the nape of her neck. Hermione hummed in contented approval.
"Stay here," Draco said, rubbing her back. She turned her face into his chest and let out a breath.
"As long as you want. Get your own flat, or don't. Fill up my bookshelves and take my bedroom for yourself, I don't care. Just don't leave."
"And?" Doctor Jones asked. She was sitting forward on the edge of her chair, pen poised above a pad of paper.
Draco ran a hand through his hair. Just thinking about it made his heart want to beat out of his chest.
"That woman has a LOT of books, Doc," he said, and he couldn't help but grin.
Hermione hadn't expressly said 'yes', but she had kissed him so sweetly that he thought he might die a happy man if that had been his last moment alive. And then they had seen the moon rise over London, and then he had bundled her back inside because it was too chilly to romance someone on a rooftop when there weren't any stars to distract them.
"My, my," Dr. Jones said, leaning back in her chair. She smiled. "Honestly, I've never seen you look so serene."
Draco blushed in spectacular Malfoy fashion. "I don't feel serene. I feel petrified that she'll come to her senses at any moment."
"And why is that?"
"Because I have done nothing much to deserve her," he said. He looked down at his hands.
"Have you spoken to her about the parameters of your relationship?"
"No," he admitted. He remembered the way she had looked at him when she had stepped back inside, through the window, and smiled.
"What?" he asked, closing the window and drawing the deep velvet curtains shut. Hermione shook her head, but her smile remained.
"How do I let you talk me into things so easily?" she asked. "Going to the sea for the weekend, climbing on the roof…"
"Moving in?" he finished for her. He leaned against his bedpost. She nodded.
"You make me sound so devious."
"You are certainly cunning, but I don't believe you're attempting to trick me into anything I don't already want to do," she said. "And I don't think you're devising a scheme with me in mind."
"You would be right about that," he chuckled. "I can't think straight with you around, let alone plot your doom."
"That's a relief."
"Thought you'd like that."
"I like you," she said. She sat on the beautiful quilt that lay over his mattress. And then she yawned, a big, gaping, lioness sort of yawn, which made him like her all the more.
Draco sat beside her on the bed. He gently pulled back the quilt and nodded for her to get underneath it. She crawled up towards the pillows and wiggled beneath the starry blanket. He gently helped her take out the elastic from her hair, so her curls could tumble down around her ears. She smiled sleepily.
He removed his wand from his trouser leg, where he had holstered it inside a tall black sock before they had left the cottage. It seemed like ages ago that they left the seaside, but it had only been that morning. Things were moving so fast, but they just… they felt right.
Draco flicked his wand and the stove dimmed. He turned his back to Hermione and set his wand on a small table beside the bed. "Do you mind… if I sleep in my pants? Will that bother you? You DO have my pyjamas in your possession."
She held up a finger and wiggled her legs under the quilt. After a little wiggle dance, she produced the pyjama pants from beneath the blanket and tossed them to him. Draco attempted not to turn scarlet as he imagined her trouser-less in his bed. He cleared his throat.
"Right. Thank you." He quickly shucked off his trousers and replaced them with the pyjama pants. Then, he joined her under the quilt. He lay facing her.
They both let out a nervous laugh.
"How many girls have slept here?" she asked softly, though he could tell it pained her to ask such a question. She blushed.
He shook his head. "None."
"Right," she said, letting go of a bated breath. "Sorry. For asking."
"It's all right, Hermione," he said. He brushed her cheek with his thumb. "I am an ordinary person with sexual desires and the like, but have never conducted such activities here. Nor have I wanted anyone else to see my flat. Only you."
"And what did she have to say to that?" Dr. Jones asked.
"She didn't say anything. She just smiled as if I had given her a puppy," he said with a laugh.
"And now she's staying with you?"
"I suppose she is. Until she tells me otherwise," Draco said. He shrugged, but his joy was obvious.
Draco and Dr. Jones parted ways for the day with the usual niceties, and a promise that he would return in a week's time. For once, he hadn't minded reliving what had happened in a session. The events of the previous evening were burned so clearly in his mind that he could think of nothing else. Especially the end, just before he lost consciousness.
Draco held her hand over his heart. Her eyelids were heavy, threatening sleep at any moment.
"And do you imagine you'll have such… desires for me?" she asked. "Or not?"
He pushed up onto one elbow and smiled. She blushed under his gaze.
Draco leaned down and kissed her slowly, tugging at her bottom lip. He cupped the back of her head and deepened the kiss, running his tongue along the seam of her lips. She sighed and parted her lips. His tongue stroked hers in a languid introduction. He suppressed a growl at the back of his throat when her arms wrapped around his waist, pressing their bodies together. Gently, he pulled away, resting his forehead against hers.
"Very much," he whispered.
Hermione put her hand over his heart. "Well." She cleared her throat and sounded thoroughly breathless.
"But not tonight. When we both have our wits about us," he said. He lay back down on the pillow beside her. and she clutched his hand to her chest this time.
"Goodnight, Draco," she murmured, eyes closed. She wiggled closer to him.
He squeezed her hand, closed his eyes, and sighed happily.
"Goodnight, 'Mione."