Reformed
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Goldensnitch18
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Rated M for Scenes of a Sexual Nature, Language, and Violence.
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Summary: Draco Malfoy is released from Azkaban and sent to Hogwarts for his eighth year where he has a year to show that he can be reformed. Hermione Granger, and her friends, are struggling to come to terms with what has happened to them and move on, but she has agreed to be Malfoy's Muggle Studies tutor anyway.
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Disclaimer: I am not profiting from this story.
Anything you recognize belongs to the great and mighty JKR.
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Chapter Twenty-Four
Wednesday, January 13th, 1999
The shop had been empty for over a year at least. There was obvious signs of neglect everywhere. The windows and surfaces were covered in a thick layer of dust. Spiderwebs lurked in far too many dark spaces for Ron's comfort. He kept his hand by his wand just in case one of them decided to produce an actual spider. After his second year, there was no way he would trust any of the spiders in Hogsmeade to not be intent on eating him.
"What do you think?" George asked. He looked around the shop as if it was his brand new baby. In many ways, Ron supposed it was.
"It's filthy," Ron said, mostly just to irritate his older brother.
"Yeah, well, you should have seen the Diagon Alley shop when we bought it. Worse than this by far." George wiped at the old counter. The disturbed dust flew into the air.
"It'll be good." Ron hit him on the back as he passed him and moved deeper into the space. Behind the counter was a door which he discovered led to a storage room. There was mostly more dust, but there were a few boxes as well. Ron hoped they were empty.
"Do you think you could fix it up? Get it ready to operate?" George followed him into the storage room.
"You sure?" Ron asked. George had told him of his plans to have Ron take point on the new shop that morning before they left to come see the space. He was still a little surprised that George trusted him to do this on his own, but he was looking forward to the task. It already felt like he belonged here a little bit more than he did in Diagon Alley.
"Completely. Just don't screw it up," George told him, winking.
"When is our goal?" Ron asked him.
"It would be great if we could get her running before the students leave, but realistically, grand opening will probably happen in the summer."
"We'll be set for September though. The quick shipments from here will be incredible." Ron said, looking in the direction of Hogwarts, though he couldn't see it through the wall. He half wished he could head up there and just drop in on Hermione.
"I will be highly disappointed if the Hogwarts student body does not take advantage of our close proximity," George agreed.
XXX
Saturday, January 16th, 1999
"You know, this is important," Hermione insisted as Draco's breath ghosted across her neck, his lips dragging their way up to her ear. They were in their classroom again, door locked behind them, N.E.W.T.s study materials spread across multiple desks. Hermione had created color coded charts for them both and spent an entire afternoon explaining the schedule to Draco as he tried to pretend that he wasn't finding her anxiety and over-preparedness adorable and a bit unnecessary. He finally gave in to his baser desires when she tried to shift gears from lecturing about the schedule to actually using it. She wanted him to study Potions for two hours, but he had no intention of doing anything until after they took a nice break.
"I don't know what you're talking about," he whispered. He pulled her tighter into his lap and her body betrayed her mind, pressing her body down to grind against his. She was wearing a skirt even though it was the weekend, and he was so, so grateful.
"Fuck, Draco. We have to study for N.E.W.T.s." Her voice had already reached that lovely, deep tone it took on when they were shagging. Her resistance was already futile.
"Breaks are imperative for our emotional health. You're mind will be clearer after I've made you come. Less distractions that way." As he spoke, his hand wound under her blessed skirt. Her fingers dug into his arms as he slid his fingers inside of her.
"We both managed just fine with O.W.L.s without it," she whispered as her hips rocked slightly against his hand.
"That's because neither of us had any idea what you were missing. Now that we know" — his thumb found her clit and began to spin in rhythmic circles — "you will surely need regular attention to relieve your stress and need. I know that I will."
"How regular?" Her hands were down between them now, pulling at the button of his trousers.
"I would say … at least once a session. Some study sessions may call for more diligent stress relief. There may be times when … well …" He trailed off as she freed him. Her hand slid up and down his cock, ensuring that he was hard before they shifted their position to allow her to sink down onto him.
"Draco," she moaned his name, her need climbing as she engulfed him. "Okay. Scheduled breaks," she agreed against his neck, her teeth following her words by sinking into his skin.
Draco gasped and bucked up into her. "Sometimes we may need to forget studying all together and do an intensive course of action." His hands gripped her ass, digging into the soft flesh as she rode him.
"Shut up," she told him as her head fell forward onto his shoulder and her breath grew more labored. They were never going to get through their N.E.W.T.s prep at this rate. She would fail to get any N.E.W.T.s and surely be drug through the press for having lost all sense, and Draco would wind up back in Azkaban, and it would all be because she couldn't say no when he turned on that low voice and touched her below her damn skirt.
XXX
Monday, January 18th, 1999
Ginny knew what she needed to do. She avoided actually doing it as long as she could, trying to come up with another option that might get her what she needed, but when it really came down to it; there is no replacement for your mother's advice. So, she found herself arriving at the Burrow on a brisk January morning. Her heart thumped madly in her chest as a blend of emotions erupted inside her heart. She loved her mother. She had missed her, and if she was really going to be honest, this thing between them had probably gone on far too long. It was time to figure out how to leave it in the past, and see if she could do something to help Harry.
As she crossed the yard, Ginny tried to collect herself, imagining what she would say when her mother opened the door, but no words were coming to mind. The front door she had so easily walked through a million times before seemed nearly insurmountable. She knew she could just walk in. She knew her parents would expect her to, but it didn't feel right. She felt like a visitor to this place she had called home for so long. Harry was her home now.
She rose her hand to knock, but the door swung open on its hinges. Her mother was on her in the next moment, hugging her tightly. Ginny was instantly overwhelmed by the familiar scents of baking and rosemary shampoo, both of which would forever remind her of her mother and fill her with a feeling of safety and security with which nothing else could compete. She broke down entirely, falling against Molly, letting out a loud sob as she began to cry. It didn't matter if she ugly cried to her Mum. She had seen and heard it all, rocked her to sleep as a screaming babe, laid with her in the middle of the night after her nightmares, and held Ginny as she had cried for Harry, for all of them, on more than one occasion during the war. It felt so unbelievably right to fall to pieces now in her warm embrace.
"Ginny," her mother whispered, and Ginny could feel that she was crying as well. They stood there for a long time in each other's arms, each refusing to let go of the other.
XXX
They had settled themselves in the kitchen sitting at the table, cups of tea held in both of their hands. The kitchen looked much the same as it always had, the same as it had looked at Christmas, the same as it had looked the day Ginny had stormed out and left her home, likely for good. As Ginny sat in one of the worn wooden chairs, her stomach bubbled with dualing sensations of belonging and unease. She reached up to nervously twist a lock of her hair which had fallen loose from the bun she had piled it all in before practice that day.
"So," her mother began as Ginny said, "I need your help."
"Okay." The older woman lifted her cup to her lips, sipping as she waited for Ginny to continue.
"Or advice, I guess," Ginny corrected. "It's Harry." She already knew that her parents were concerned about him, that they had reached out to him on several occasions in hopes of him letting them help, so she was sure that her Mum would understand.
Molly nodded, her expression growing sad, accentuating the lines in her aging face. After two wars, seven children, and the loss of Fred, there was no denying that her mother, her parents really, were getting older. "Your father and I are worried about him."
"I think most people who love Harry are worried about him," Ginny agreed. She let out a breath and stared down into her own cup. "He's … He won't talk about it at all, Mum. Not to me. Not to Hermione. Not even Ron. He's just … he's so bottled up with it all. I feel like … like I'm failing him." Admitting that she wasn't able to help Harry alone was a unique kind of painful.
"Ginny" — her warm, life worn hand fell onto one of Ginny's Quidditch worn hands, squeezing gently — "you can't be responsible for fixing Harry all on your own, especially when he's insisting on persevering as if nothing happened."
"It's suffocating," Ginny told her as tears began to roll down her cheek. She tried to brush them away with her free hand, but they just kept coming, unbidden. "It's like there is Harry and me, and then there is this huge weight in the room that is everything he won't deal with."
"You can't keep living that way, either of you." Molly shook her head and lifted her cup to her lips, and Ginny wondered if it was to keep herself from saying something more. Her mother's tone, her body, everything was overly gentle in this moment.
"I know. I … I don't want to give up on him, but I can't do this. I can't keep having one sided conversations and pretend like I don't know he's falling apart inside. I can't keep wondering if he's ever going to really come back to me from that tent he was living in." It was as if his mind was still out there, out there in the forest, dead set on staying there for the rest of his days.
"Have you told him all of this? Exactly how you feel? That you need him to open up?" Molly asked, her voice still softer than normal.
"I don't know. We've argued about it, but even that feels like nothing is really accomplished." Ginny sighed and ran her finger along the brim of her cup.
"Sometimes things like this are taken best when you aren't arguing. I think you need to figure out exactly how you feel and what you need to stay with Harry, and then tell him."
"You're not … I mean you aren't going to try to get me to move back here?" She almost felt a bit guilty bringing it up, but she knew that she needed to make it clear that this trip hadn't been about that.
It was her mother's turn to sigh softly. "I don't love the two of you living together before you're married. I would be very happy if you moved home until that happened, but I have no doubt in the way either of you feels for the other, and I can't lose you. I can't not have you, knowing that you're out there. It's … I can't do that again."
"Okay," Ginny said, suddenly feeling the weight of Percy's long hiatus from the family and Fred's more permanent passing. It wasn't right for any of them to be at odds like this. It wasn't right for any of them to waste whatever time they had together. She needed to do her part to not let things like this fester and grow into rifts that separated them for months at a time. It wasn't always easy being part of a family, but she was lucky to still have hers, to still have people that loved and cared about her, and she owed them her best effort at the very least.
"Would you and Harry want to come to dinner Saturday? It will just be Dad and I." Her mother's voice was calm and even, but Ginny could tell that the question was anything but easy and light. Ginny could easily tell her Mum that it was too early for that, but she wouldn't do that. Not this time.
"Yeah," she said. "Yeah, I would like that."
XOXO
Meg
