Chapter 43

He wordlessly summoned the cushions and throw from her sofa, resting his head on the cushion. Hoping it wasn't too affectionate, she laid her head on his chest.

He just covered them with the blanket.

"Wow. I should come over early more often," He said, his voice half laughing.

"Don't tease me," she grumbled.

"I'm not, I'm just glad you've figured out how irresistible I am," He replied.

She rolled her eyes and rested her chin on his chest so she could look up at him, "You're incorrigible."

His eyes glinted, and he used an arm behind his head to prop up. Hermione allowed herself one moment of weakness to admire his beautifully sculpted muscles.

He raised an eyebrow,"Really? I think I'm getting plenty of encouragement."

She stuck out her tongue and he laughed, the sound quietly shaking her bones.

He froze, fiddling with something under the cushion before retrieving her lacy pale blue panties.

He smirked, "I like this color on you. Reminds me of the Yule ball."

She colored, "Me too, that's why I bought them. I'm surprised you remember."

"It's odd what comes back to you after all this time," He mused, before looking down at her with a wicked gleam, "At the ball did you already know I was your soulmate?"

He'd mentioned it jokingly several times, but to hear him casually mention the Maritare charm sent a confusing thrill through her.

"Yes," she answered honestly.

He laughed a little, "Oh that's too funny. No wonder you were so hung up on Weasley asking you. You wanted to prove to yourself it didn't matter."

"Excuse you! I liked Ron, it had nothing to do with you," she sniffed

"So then you didn't think about it at all while you were pining away after Weaslebee?" He challenged.

Hermione kept her face neutral, "Well of course I thought about it. Once or twice."

He had an odd smile on, "What were you thinking?"

"I was mostly just thinking… 'even the universe is saying Ron doesn't like you,'" she smiled back.

"But he did of course," Malfoy said lightly.

"Eventually," she laughed.

"Do you think it will be strange for you to see him with Blaise?" He added, " If it works out, I'm still not convinced that Blaise can give up his playing around."

"I don't know," she answered, "We ended things a long time ago but- is this a weird thing to talk about?"

"I'll live," He reassured her.

"Just sometimes... I do wonder," She admitted, "Logically, I want him to be happy, whether or not it's with me. But feelings aren't always logical."

Like how I'm having feelings for you, she thought.

On her back, his hand tightened into a fist, but his voice was breezy, "How did things end? If you don't mind me asking."

She looked up at him warily, "Are you sure you want to know?"

He nodded.

Hermione took in a little breath and rested her head on his chest so she was facing away from him.

"Well... the war was tough on both of us, but I had a really hard time bouncing back," She began, "When Harry killed Voldemort, everything… I mean, all of the bad stuff was supposed to be over."

"But it wasn't," Malfoy said simply.

"For you too?" She asked.

"For me too."

Hermione smiled, "I had problems with my dreams. I would wake up screaming when I didn't even know I'd fallen asleep. I had a hard time letting people touch me after… after your house."

Malfoy was silent.

"And I didn't have my parents, like Ron, although he was going through so much too," Hermione said softly.

"So what happened?" Malfoy prompted.

"I got very depressed and just… I pushed him away," She shortened the months of fighting to something less traumatic sounding, "There were a number of reasons... Ron wasn't sure he could take care of me the way he thought I needed. He said he just wasn't cut out for it. And he was right, he could only do so much. I needed to help myself."

Malfoy didn't respond, but his hand rubbed across her shoulder comfortingly.

She took in a steadying breath before continuing, "I went to St Mungo's for a while. Got things straightened out. My dreams are better now. And Ron and I just never... Reconnected in that way I guess."

"I'm sorry you didn't work out," Malfoy said gently.

She smiled to keep from crying, "Oh yeah, you really wish that?"

"No, but it sounded better than calling Weasley an asshat," Malfoy's voice dripped with humor, "What kind of weakling leaves his girlfriend because she's having flashbacks to being a war hero?"

Hermione didn't know if she wanted to laugh or slap him. "I'm not explaining it right. I kept… I thought I could deal with everything on my own, and so I pushed him away. We just... weren't moving forward. At all."

He interrupted the silence, "Do you ever wonder if you could get back together, as your older wiser selves?"

She smiled, "Do I sense a drop of jealousy?"

"Hard to be jealous when I've been shagged into the floor."

She let that stand, "Touché. Honestly, sometimes I do. Then sometimes, I think that we might just repeat the same problems."

He nodded.

She cleared her throat, "So what about you?"

"Me?" He responded.

"Yeah, how did you break up with your great love?" She asked.

He laughed, "She was no great love."

"The question still stands," Hermione laughed with him, "I told you about my breakup."

"I never said I'd tell you about mine," He pretended offense.

"Oh come on," She teased, turning to look at him.

"Fine. But I can't say it was as noble as Weasley," He raised an eyebrow, "Don't judge me too harshly."

She smiled, "As long as you can deal with the fact that I still have nightmares."

He looked down at her, his face blank, "You still do?"

She nodded.

"I do too. Probably not as bad, though," He shook a lock of silvery hair out of his eyes, "Well… Where to start? Astoria's parents and my parents were… very friendly. The Greengrass's are fairly old fashioned. They expected their daughters to get married pretty much right out of Hogwarts."

Hermione knew she was pulling a face, "Yeah, I heard."

"From who?"

"Theodore Nott."

Malfoy raised an eyebrow but didn't comment on her speaking to Theodore Nott, "Ah, he would know more than anyone. Well, the reason why the Greengrass's are especially worried is that they're related to many of the pureblood families in England. Very closely related. Because my father's family was from France, they were always trying to get us to spend time together."

"Pardon me, but isn't that a little antiquated?"

"Yes it is, but it's not totally out of the ordinary for families like mine," He explained, eyeing the ceiling thoughtfully, "Besides, I liked Astoria. She understood the pressure I was under."

"So when did you two start dating for real?"

"Sixth year. We had fun together, when I had the time for her. She calmed me down, and for that, I thought I was in love with her. But it was hard to explain everything to her. She was younger, and very… I guess the word is enthusiastic. She was very enthusiastic about the Dark Lord." His face was blank, but she could see his eye twitch just a little. "When I… when I failed to kill Dumbledore she was very upset. We fought. We wrote letters. She wanted to get married as soon as possible. But I…"

"You didn't want to?" Hermione supplied when it seemed like he really couldn't answer.

"There were a lot of reasons," He replied obtusely, " But things changed for me. And I realized that I wasn't in love with her, like I thought. I just liked that feeling, that calmness."

"So how did you break up?" Hermione asked.

"I wrote to her, I told her that I didn't want to be Voldemort's whipping boy any longer, and that if she wanted me to, we couldn't really be together. And she-" He paused, and then laughed a little, "She told my aunt."

"Oh," Hermione said quietly.

He smiled, "It wasn't as if they could do much more than they were already doing. They wanted to perform memory spells on me, try to convert me."

Hermione's brow furrowed, " Why?"

"Why not kill me, you mean?" Malfoy said thoughtfully, "I'm not totally sure. Voldemort was always trying to think thirty steps ahead and failing miserably, he must have had some plan for me."

Hermione's blood ran ice cold. Maybe Voldemort knew something they didn't?

She nestled her head closer into his chest, "But the memory charms didn't work?"

"I'm a fairly skilled Occlumens, and lucky for me it was my aunt and not the dark lord himself," He yawned, "So… needless to say, I'm not looking forward to a reconciliation with Astoria."

Hermione rubbed a hand along his chest. "Why not? She sounds like a real sweetheart."

He laughed, "A joke? Granger, am I rubbing off on you?"

"You'd better be," She teased.

He pulled her chin up to kiss her, " I like you when you're bad, Granger."

I like you when you're good, she thought.

He let out a sigh, like something he'd been holding onto for a long time. "Your 'movie' thing really took it out of me."

She burst out into peals of laughter.

"What?" He smiled, shaking his head in confusion.

"Movies are like… like stories. I was saying I wanted something like a story."

He laughed again then, rich and true. "And here I thought I was learning some muggle sex tricks. Shame"